Children of Enterprise
by Loptr
Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there’s more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T’pol’s arms. [FINISHED]
1. Peekaaboo, I see you

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

A/N: Traduit was complaining that I've put all my other friends except her in a fic so, even though you don't like Enterprise, here you go. Teehee.

_**IOIOIO**_

Reclining back in his chair, Archer looked out over the green and blue roiling expanse of the Traduit nebula. Flashes of white and yellow lit it up like a magnificent display and for a while, Archer's attention was on nothing else.

"Damn, this universe never ceases to surprise me." Trip said behind him and he half turned to face his Engineer smiling.

"I know how you feel, hard to imagine there could be anything that beautiful in the universe. T'pol, what do you think?" His first officer looked up from her console, raising an eyebrow.

"If you are asking what I think of its beauty, I do, indeed, find it aesthetically pleasing."

"Aesthetically pleasing?" Trip snorted. "Come on T'pol, say it. It's pretty." She returned to her console without a word.

"Kinda reminds me of the Auctarian mists." Travis said, sitting back in his chair slightly.

"The what?" Trip asked, leaning against the railing, preparing to stay for the long haul.

"On Auctarian Prime, they only have one really big ocean because it's so hot there. Not hot like Vulcan but humid, like the rain forest or something. Me and my dad took a boat out on the ocean to see the mists. At night, after a really hot day, the water mists over and you get this green and blue fog roiling just over the surface. When you shine a lantern down, little shadow play across it and look like little nymphs playing in the mists. It's gorgeous. We should go there some time. I'm sure the commander would find it aesthetically pleasing." Trip sniggered and looked back out of the view screen.

"T'pol, can you take a pic of that thing? I'd love to send one home to mom, she loves things like that." T'pol looked up from her console, her brow furrowed.

"This is a science station, not a camera. The sensors are taking in telemetry."

"Yeah, but can you take a picture?" With a roll of her eyes she returned to work at her console.

"A still of the Nebula has been forwarded to your Comm. System. Feel free to retrieve it and print it in your own leisure." Trip winked at T'pol.

"Thanks T'pol. You're a star."

"I am Vulcan." Although her face was serious and devoid of emotion, it didn't take a genius to figure out she was cracking a joke and it wasn't lost on the bridge crew who broke into a fit of laughter

"Sir…I'm picking up three ships, closing in on our position." Reed said, his concerned voice lacing through the laughter. "Unknown configuration."

"Hail th…" Archer started but phaser fire, rocking the ship cut him off. "Polarise the hull! I want weapons!" Archer shouted as the ship was thrown about again.

"I can't. Systems are locked out!" Malcolm exclaimed, his console squawking protest at every command he entered.

"SIR! Helm's locked out!" Travis reported as he fought with the controls but it was of no use.

"We're going to warp!" Trip said incredulously. "Warp one…two…three, we're accelerating so fast! Five…Six! SEVEN! My god, EIGHT!" Trip was getting excited. "Holding steady at Warp 8.5…We've left the system! …dropping out of warp. Sir? Sir!" He looked to see an empty Command chair. "Where's the Cap'n?" T'pol pulled herself up from where she had been knocked to the floor and Travis turned. Archer was no where on the bridge.

"Malcolm, run an internal scan of the ship, find out if Archer's on board." Trip said urgently, running to the Brit's console. Malcolm shook his head.

"He's not on board but I am picking up an intruder in his quarters. One life sign, humanoid…I'm not sure if it's human or not. It…could be." Trip jogged down the steps and hit the arm on Archer's chair, the bottom of it swung open and released a phase pistol.

"A little modification I put in." he explained at T'pol's raised eyebrow. "Mal, you're with me." The two men entered the turbolift, ordering it to take them to C Deck where the quarters were situated. Trip bounced on the balls of his feet until it opened and he ran out, stopping just in front of Archers quarters. He keyed in the code he had seen John use a thousand times and stepped inside, phaser outstretched.

The room was empty.

He motioned to Malcolm to search the bathroom as he checked the storage closet by the door. The bathroom was too small to hide anyone and it, too, was empty.

"Did you hear that, Sir?" Malcolm asked, tilting his head to one side. "It sounds like someone's…crying?" Trip listened.

"You're right, Mal. It's coming from…over there…" He motioned to the far side of the room where Archers bed and closet were. Trip aimed his phaser as he approached the door and hit the button. It slid open and immediately a high pitched wail of pure terror filled the room and the tiny little girl in the closet threw her arms over her head.

"NO! NO! AWAY!" She screamed, curling into an even tighter ball amidst the uniforms. Porthos, who had been watching the two men from his basket, immediately began to bark and leapt into the closet with her, growling at Trip.

"Hey, woah. Down boy." Trip said, taking a step back. "Don't worry darlin' I ain't gonna hurt ya." The girl didn't stop crying and Porthos snapped at Trip threateningly. Trip took another step back and Porthos, it seemed, judged this to be a respectable distance and turned to face the girl, licking her face and pawing her shoulder. She threw her arms around the dog and cried into the dark fur of his back.

"Hey there, pet, what's your name?" Malcolm asked quietly, putting his phase pistol to one side and crouching down. She looked up, her tear stained face familiar somehow.

"Mal-mal?" She said questioningly and began to wail anew, this time stretching her hands out from him to pick her up. "MAL!" She screamed, reaching for him. "UP! Wan' Daddy! Bring daddy!" She screamed and Malcolm reached in to pick her up. Porthos growled but didn't snap or bite as he picked up the little girl, cradling her close. "Maly!" She sobbed. "Want daddy." She sobbed. "Bring daddy." Malcolm swept back her hair, hoisting her up higher in his arms to look into her face.

"Who's your daddy, pumpkin?" He asked, tucking the girls sable hair behind her ears. "…Trip. I think you should see this." He said, his face hardening and turning from sensitive to serious in a heartbeat.

"What?" Trip stepped forward and shot a warning glance at Porthos who was lying at Malcolm's feet. Now that the girl had quietened down and was wrapped around Malcolm's neck, fastidiously sucking her thumb, he seemed to have quietened.

"Are those what I think they are?"

_**IOIOIO**_

Archer groaned, opening his eyes to a dimly lit room and the stench of rotting meat. It took him several moments to adjust to the light, or lack thereof, and when he had, he really wished he hadn't opened his eyes. He was chained up in a small room and looking at the corpse beside him, he figured it wasn't a room easily escaped from.

He tugged at his bonds lightly and winced as small pins on the inside dug into his wrists.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you." Came a female voice from the dark corner of the room. "The more you pull, the deeper they're going to go and it wouldn't do if you bled to death. Jimmy boy beside you isn't much a conversationalist." Archer squinted, he could barely make out the figure lying against the wall. A pair of eyes shined out of the darkness almost like a cats and there was a rustling of cloth as whoever it was sat up.

"Who are you?"

"My name is T'rialta." She said, enigmatically and Archer could almost feel her studying him. It was a very disconcerting feeling.

"They call me Archer…" He vaguely noted that his Universal Translator was off and yet he could understand her perfectly. "You're speaking English."

"I am? It sounds to me like you are speaking my language. Perhaps there is a translator in the room." One booted foot slid into the small ring of light coming from the door. Unless he was very much mistaken those were the exact same kinda of boots he was wearing. Standard Starfleet issue.

"Perhaps." He looked around the dismal room with smooth grey walls and cuffs attached halfway down to allow whoever was in them to sit. There was a small grate in the steel door that looked like an old fashioned swinging one. "Where are we?"

"You're on a Cardassian vessel. Not a nice place to be for very long. They've never encountered your specie before so they'll probably interrogate you brutally then give you over to their doctor for a bunch of experiments before they cut you open. If you're lucky, you'll be dead by then." Archer paled.

"Well I'm hoping it's not going to come to that."

"It will."

"You sound so sure."

"I've been here a long time, they don't listen to reason. If they did then they wouldn't have snatched you in the first place. Where are you from?" Archer sighed, slumping back against the wall and relaxing his aching arms.

"Earth." There was a snort of laughter.

"You're a long way from Earth. How did you get here?"

"On my ship, the Enterprise." There was a small grunt of approval.

"I've heard of it…you said _your_ ship, that mean you the Captain?" Archer nodded, leaning his head against the wall and staring at the arched roof above him. "Then maybe we can be of use to each other. How about a deal. I can get you out of here but I can not get home. If I get you out of here, you can get us to your ship, right?"

"I can try."

"Well…If I get you out of here, then you get us to Enterprise and allow me to stay for awhile while I make…arrangements."

"I thought you said there was no getting out of here."

"I also said I've been here a while. They don't even cuff me anymore." She rolled away from the wall to lay in front of Archer, supported on the balls of her feet and her hands but still just out of the light. "I can get us a shuttle but I can't fly it."

"Why not?"

"I've been in this dimly lit room for two years. I can't see anymore, not properly but I know my way around the ship. What do you say?" She extended a slim hand and Archer raised an amused eyebrow, tilting his head to one side.

"I'm a little tied up at the moment." The girl reached up and snapped the chains with her bare hands, taking his wrists gently, she pulled them onto her lap and examined the cuffs.

"This'll only take a moment." She said, her slender fingers slipping beneath the cuffs and Archer heard a loud click before they popped open. Immediately Archer wrenched them out and began to massage the damaged appendages.

"Alright, but how do I know I can trust you?" She lent even further forward into the light so that Archer could see her. She looked young, eighteen, perhaps nineteen. Her hair hung long and lanky with grease in front of her face, and her eyes were white with blindness but there was no denying the slanted eyebrows and pointed ears.

"Vulcan's don't lie."

_**IOIOIO**_

A/N: I know this is short but this is just the prologue. Before you berate me that she didn't seem too Vulcan or that humans didn't encountered Cardassians until such a date then I'd ask you not to because as I said in the summary, there is a little more to this than meets the eye and all will be explained…_eventually. _The reason why T'pol didn't say anything to Trip for taking Command even though she's know the ranking officer is because…well…I didn't feel like making her say anything. Didn't see the point. Don't forget to review, they are the life blood of authors and it wouldn't do any good if I died now, would it? Also, this is A/Tp but it is T/T friendly. (I bet you're wondering how I pulled that one off, eh?) Well read on to find out and tell me what you think by that blue little button. Now, this A/N is nearly as long as the fic so I'm going to end it.


	2. Prosthetics and daggers

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

A/n: Glad ye all like the first chapter, hope ye like this as much.

Tata: Yeah, Trip and Mal are my favourite characters to write. They get on so well and compliment each other on the show. AS for the girl, you'll see more of her in chapter three than now.

dennisud: Such a pessimist. lol. It won't be as A/U as you think because it is meant to be set in the six or so years left un covered by the end of the show to 'These are the Voyages'

Myxale: Whinny little prologue? I'm offended! Nah, only joking. Every day on Enterprise starts as a nice dayusually in the show before all hell breaks looseso I thought, why not lul them into a false sense of security with it being a nice normal day too. Like I said before, this kinda skims over the girl a little and you don't find out what had Malcolm and Trip so shocked until the next chapter but...I dunno, it's the way I wrote it.

_**IOIOIO**_

T'rialta was back in her dark corner and Archer could hear the sounds of metal scraping against metal.

"Do I know you?" He asked suddenly and the scraping stopped.

"No, why?" Although his eyes had adjusted to the dim light, he could hardly see her but he could tell she had gone unnaturally still.

"Your name, it just sounds familiar. That's all."

"It's a common Vulcan name." She said, a little too quickly for Archers liking and she returned to her task. Lord only knew what she was doing. He thought about it a moment, the name was familiar but he didn't think it had anything to do with Vulcans. Had he heard Malcolm mention the name? He was sure he had.

"What are you doing?" He asked, tying to gather as much data on what was happening as possible.

"Must you talk excessively?" She snapped, there was a loud clunk and she disappeared into the wall with a gruff, "Come on." Archer crawled over to where she had been working and saw a piece of the bulkhead had been removed and two boots retreating down the passage speedily. Ever since he had met her something didn't seem right. She didn't act Vulcan, didn't sound Vulcan hell, she barely even looked Vulcan but a deep gut feeling told him to trust her for now. He was all for gut feelings but he had to be practical about this. He had just been kidnapped from his ship, woken up in a prison of some sort and was now entrusting his life into the hands of an ill tempered Vulcan he hardly knew…This was happening way too often!

He crawled for what seemed like hours in the cramped, dark space between bulkheads with wires dangling dangerously low over his head, when he finally emerged he appeared to be in a cargohold of some sort and the Vulcan was already entering a ship on the far side of the bay. To call it small would have been generous and it didn't look like any Vulcan ship he had ever seen.

"T'rialta?" He hissed, approaching the ship. "T'rialta." He said again, louder this time.

"I am blind, not deaf, Captain. What?"

"What is this?" He asked, settling into the soft, cream leather seat beside her.

"It's a runabout, Captain."

"I can see that, it doesn't look like any ship I've ever seen before." He ran a hand along the red console that had vaguely lime coloured blocks rising out of its surface. Nothing was labelled or marked in anyway but T'rialta's hands skittered over its surface, leaving a trail of glowing blocks in her wake. The ship began to power up and various systems all around him sprang to life "What are you doing? Do you know how to even fly this ship?" She didn't answer, instead taking a small device out of her pocket.

"Captain, this ships inertial dampeners are severally damaged, I'd put on that seatbelt to your right." He looked to see a small clip hanging from the wall and he drew it diagonally over his body, clipping it into a slot in the panel beside his chair. "Hold onto something, I'm going to jump to warp."

"What do you mean hold…" The ship rocked violently and he felt a force pushing him back in his chair. He knew it couldn't be more than two Gs and not the impact of jumping to warp but whatever it was it worsened his already violent headache. It only lasted a few moments and when they were free he looked over at his pilot. She was staring intently at the controls, her eyes moving over a display screen to her left and taking in the readings.

"We're free of their force sheilds, that was the force you felt, similar to breaking orbit." She said, answering his unvoiced question. "What was the last known coordinates of your ship?" She asked, looking over at Archer.

"We were on a course for the Traduit Nebula." She nodded and turned back to work the controls. It was when he looked at her in profile that several things seriously stood out to him. Firstly was the cranial ridge that was almost invisible when looking at her straight on, the second was that her eyes were moving rapidly from left to right as she read..

"You know, if you're blind, why are you looking at the controls?" Her head snapped to face him and he punched her, sending her sprawling against a display screen. She was only stunned for a few moments and Archer reached to undo his belt so he could get at her easier. He was locked in tight. As he struggled with the restraints she swung back and elbowed him in the face to subdue him. With a snarl she grabbed a hypo from her pocket and discharged it against his arm.

"You never make things easy, do you John." She asked as he slumped into unconsciousness. The ship shuddered again as she decreased warp to warp two. They were in no hurry and if Techie was doing his job then the Enterprise would be right where she left it. Checking a small chrono hanging fro her belt she grimaced. It wouldn't take much longer now.

_**IOIOIO**_

The Engineer looked left and right to make sure no one was watching as he took one of the plasma injectors offline. He had already overridden the warning controls so unless someone physically checked the injectors, no one would know it was offline. they'd just have an inexplicable increase in pressure in the intermix chamber. According to all diagnostics everything would be online and running smoothly.

He allowed himself a small satisfied smirk as he turned away, colliding with Commander Tucker.

"Woah, you alrigh'?" He asked but the man was already hurrying on with a hurried 'sorry Sir.'

"Someone's in a hurry." He grumbled, checking the intermix chamber. There was a two percent increase in pressure in the intermix chamber but that was nothing to be worried about.

"Sir, there's a four percent increase in pressure in the intermix chamber." He looked back at the screen. Right before his eyes pressure increased another two percent.

"I'll be damned, we'll have to take the damn warp core offline if we can't stabilise this. Irwin, Ah want you to run a diagnostic on the plasma injectors, Fernandez, check the intermix relays, Mason…" The beeping of the Comm. Beside him cut him off.

"Tucker here."

"Commander, I'm reading a ten percent increase in pressure in the…"

"Intermix Chamber, Ah know. Ah'm workin' on it!" He snapped. "Tucker out." The figures were showing a fifteen percent increase. "Ten more percent and this baby'll blow. Mason! Take her offline!" The Engineer nodded and moments later the warpcore began to dim. The Comm. Buzzed again.

"Commander, the Warp Core is…"

"Ah know the Warp Core is offline, It'll be off till Ah can find out what's causing the build up. I'll report when Ah'm done." Tucker said irritably. Something about this didn't smell right…or that could have been his five day old uniform but Tucker knew his engines and he _knew_ something was amiss.

_**IOIOIO**_

Doctor Phlox finished passing the medical scanner over Elizabeth's body and smiled.

"Well, she checks out fine and healthy. Apart from a few bumps and bruises…When was the last time you ate?" The girl shrugged.

"Not since I left home." She said, thinking about the time hard. "Two days, four hours ago…approximately." Phlox nodded his head impressed. "Well that explains that. Do you want something now?" The girl nodded eagerly, "Any preferences?"

"Pizza!" The girl said immediately. "Plain cheese." Phlox chuckled.

"I'll ask chef and see what he can do. Keep an eye on her, please, Lieutenant." Malcolm nodded. T'pol, despite his pleas, had ordered him to stay with the 'intruder' and once Phlox had declared her medically fit he was to interrogate her. Malcolm wondered how you'd interrogate a three year old child, he could hardly strap her to a chair with a swinging lamp overhead now, could he?

"Lizzy?" He asked and the girl looked up from the small animal she was watching move around its cage. "Can I ask you a few questions, pet?" The girl turned, giving her full attention to Malcolm. She looked familiar somehow, he couldn't really place his finger on it. She had big blue eyes and long sable hair and barely reached his hip. Even sitting on the biobed she only reached his chest and she became fascinated with all the zips of his pockets. "Lizzy, where are you from?"

"San Francisco." She said, zipping open one of his pockets and zipping it closed again as if it were a game.

"San Francisco?" He said allowed and the girl nodded. "Then how did you get here?"

"Ria brought me and my brother to the grumpy Vulcan. She said she had to go away for a little while because a friend was in trouble. But I not like grumpy man so I hid in ship. When I got real hungry and the coast was clear, I snuck out to get something to eat. There wasn't anything on the ship so I left and came here. I hid from Ria and then she left in her ship! I was all alonsome so I looked for someone to help."

"Lizzy, what were you doing in the closet?"

"Hiding." She said, looking around as if Malcolm had just reminded her of the fact.

"From who?" He probed gently, knowing that if the girl stopped talking, there'd be nothing he could do to persuade her to talk again.

"I in trouble. Techie told me stay out of way. He said I shouldnae a' come, he said he gonna kill Ria when she get back but it not her fault, she not know. I stow away. I bold. I sorry." She said a sniffed loudly, her eyes tearing up. "Please don't tell daddy, he'll shout, and mommy'll make me go to the grumpy Vulcan. I don't like him. He grumpy." Malcolm nodded.

"Okay, we wont tell. Promise."

"Scout honour?" She asked, raising her hand in the eagle scout salute.

"Scouts honour." He said, emulating the hand gesture. "Lizzy, what age are you?" She held up her fingers. "Three?" She nodded. For a three year old, she seemed a little…..advanced. "Lizzy, you said you were looking for your daddy, who is he? Is he on the ship?" She nodded and then looked behind Malcolm. She tilted her head to one side as if listening then shook her head.

"No! Saying no more!" She said, placing both hands over her mouth. Malcolm turned around but could see no one or nothing that would have indicated Elizabeth's sudden change.

"Lizzy, who's your mother. If you tell us who she is and where to find her then we'll bring you home." The girl shook her head.

"Techie says to tell you no more. I'm not going to tell you any more." Malcolm turned and scanned the sickbay again, when she had looked behind him she had gotten a signal of some sort to be quiet. Someone else had to be in sickbay.

The room was empty and the only access in were the main doors and a Jeffries tube…that was right behind him. He ran to it and looked up in time to see a pair of boots disappear into a higher up conduit. He grabbed his communicator and flipped it open.

"Reed to bridge, intruder alert, access tube B leading from main sickbay tube." As he climbed he heard the person pick up pace and he himself began to climb faster. He chased whoever it was for three decks, his muscles beginning to burn from having to move so fast in such a tight space. Finally he turned and a boot was straight ahead of him. He grabbed it and the man ahead looked behind. If something about the girl rang a bell then this man was chiming Big Ben. He _knew _him!

He didn't have time to deliberate the matter as the boot was shoved repetitively in his face and knocked him back down the tube. He cracked the back of his head against the roof and his chin belted one of the rungs of the ladder as he slid down it in an unconscious heap.

The man crawled back and looked down to check Reed who was lying several feet below. A nearby hatch open and two Maco's poked their head in so he was off again, navigating the tubes like a pro. He slipped through a vent into an unused quarters and ran to the closet. Pulling off the Engineering Lieutenants Uniform he replaced it with a Science Ensigns and waited. They may have gotten Lizzie but it was inconsequential to the mission. It wouldn't be long now.

**_IOIOIO_**

A/n: Hopefully it wont be too long till the next update but you can alway prod me to be quicker by pressing that little blue button and leaving a nice abusive review. Or you could just leave a nice review with encouragement...who am I kidding here, really? Anyway, thank everyone so far for reviewing, keep up the good work! (Hands out digital cupcakes)


	3. Mother dearest

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

A/N: Before the TT or AT fans get up in arms half way through this fic (You'll see why) read to the end. There are a lot of rather bizarre revelations in this fic I think you'll find surprising, especially the true identity of Techie and Lizzy.

**archangemon **: I never said I'd stop writing if I didn't get reviews because if I did I'd be lying. I write for the love of writing. Reviews are simply a spiffy bonus and while yes, I am a review whore, nothing short of a barrage of flames could stop me writing and even then, not for long. I'm sorry if it came across that way but I didn't mean it like that at all. I was only joking.

_**IOIOIO**_

"Sabotage?" T'pol repeated, picking up the broken dilithium crystal.

"First they over rode the damn warnin' system and rerouted the diagnostic patterns then they took the plasma injectors offline causing the build up in pressure. Once we had that damn problem fixed we tried ta restart the warp core and found that we couldn't. The sneaky bastard had taken three of the five the dilithium crystals out of their Matrix. We can't take the strain of running the whole ship with only a few crystals, this one already broke! We'll have to shut down all non essential systems and as for phasers, shields, scanners, hell, even getting the warp core back online! Forget it!" T'pol placed the crystal back on the desk and looked up a Trip.

"We have replacements?"

"They're gone!" Trip exclaimed, beginning to pace furiously. "And you wanna know who the computer has logged into the locker room last? ME! According to the computer I did all of this. It's all meh access codes!" Trip balled his fists, eyeing everything in the room with the intention of smashing it. He was too furious for words.

"Trip." She said softly. "Control your emotions. I'll have extra security details placed around all the major equipment and in Engineering. We shall find who ever has done this."

"…YEAH? And meanwhile, the Cap'n is off god knows where havin' god knows what done to him!" Trip sank down onto the couch, head in hands. "T'pol. How could someone get on board and do this? We're bein' manipulated on all sides an'…an' I jus' feel so god damn helpless." T'pol got up from the Captains desk and sat beside Trip, putting an arm around his shoulders in the Terran form of comfort. He placed a hand over her own as she spoke.  
"Trip, we'll do whatever we can. When we have the ship up and running we'll go looking for the captain. If I know him he'll already be formulating and executing a plan. There is a high probability he is on his way back here right now." Trip smiled.

"Ya always know what to say ta cheer me up, T'pol. I'll give ya that."

"I'll have security search the ship top to bottom and I'll do a scan for any cloaked vessels. Even the slightest nutrino trace will be looked into. You better get back to Engineering." He nodded, getting to his feet and rubbing the back of his hand against his tired eyes.

"Who'd do this T'pol?"

"We have made a few enemies among the Orions and the Klingons. There is even a chance it could be the Romulans." He nodded slowly.

"Alrigh', dang, I forgot just how many people out there hate our guts. Somethin' to write home ta mom about."

"You can inform her of her endeavours when you send her the picture?"

"The wha'?"

"The picture…of the nebula?" He smirked.

"I had forgotten abou' that. I'll see ya later T'pol. Mah engines are callin' meh." T'pol nodded solemnly to him as he left. She stood there for several moments before moving to the porthole to gaze out at the stars. She slipped into a light form of meditation and tried to sort out her feelings, her stomach was in a tight knot of worry for her Captain.

_That is an illogical thought, he is not solely my Captain, he commands the rest of the crew._

Before she could delve any deeper into that train of though the ship was hit several times by weapons fire. She ran out onto the bridge and demanded a report.

"We have no power Captain." Reed said, his British accent viciously strong with his worry.

"We're being hailed!" Hoshi said, as surprised as T'pol was but showing it more clearly. "They're demanding to speak with Captain Archer."

"On screen." T'pol said, making her way to the centre seat. Immediately a man dressed all in black with a scarf tied over his eyes, obscuring most of his upper face with only two eyeholes in it to let him see.

"T'pol? Where is Captain Archer?" The man demanded. His voice was coarse as gravel and thickly lathered with disgust as was his stare. His thin lips twisted into a grimace upon the news that Captain Archer had been kidnapped nearly six hours ago and a motion to the people behind him had a full sensor sweep done on the area.

"It's Ria's ship, Captain." One of the men behind him said and he shot up from his chair.

"That harlot! How did she get here before us?" There was silence as he marched off screen.

"Pursuit course. I'll have her heart for this and Archers HEAD! CUT THE CONNECTION!" The screen blinked off and she watched their ship warp off in the same direction the three alien ships had taken.

"What was that about?" Travis asked, still staring at starlit view, afforded by the screen.

"Seems to me whoever kidnapped Archer was trying to protect him." The Brit said from his console. "Hold on…Ria…Ria…Elizabeth was talking about a woman called Ria when I was with her. She said she stowed away on her ship and that Ria had come to help a friend in trouble. She said she beamed down to the ship while Ria and a man called Techie were here." T'pol raised an eyebrow.

"Do you think the girl knows where Archer is?"

"It's worth a shot, but she refuses to say anything more. She said that 'Techie' said to not tell us anything."

"Could Techie be whoever is sabotaging the ship?" Mayweather asked and Reed nodded.

"It's likely, but if they're here to help Archer then why are the sabotaging the ship?" T'pol pondered this a moment.

"Perhaps so that we would not leave this area of space and pursue Archer." Hoshi piped up from her console. T'pol rose.

"Idle speculation will not aide the Captain, I'll speak to the girl myself. Mister Reed, you have the bridge." He nodded to her and moved to the centre seat as she made her way to the turbolift. Her mid was racing with questions all the way there and by the time she got to sickbay she had a brief, comprehensive list to ask the child, whom she found sitting crosslegged on the floor in front of a small portable lamp. Her head was bowed and eyes closed with her soft sable hair making curtains on either side of her face.

"Elizabeth?" T'pol asked and the girl looked up, a smile blossoming on her face.

"Ta-mehk!" She exclaimed, getting to her feet. T'pol froze as the entire list flew from her mind.

No one had told her the child was Vulcan.

Although her features were softer and chubbier than most Vulcan children, and her eyebrows not as slanted as her own, there was no denying the evident green cast to her skin and slender, pointed ears. Her eyes were blue and hair lighter than T'pol's and she was sure that she had seen the child somewhere before. It was something in the structure of the cheeks and the nose, maybe the crooked line of her mouth or the way she stood. It was all too familiar to T'pol…Then it hit.

"Elizabeth, state your full name." The girl puffed herself up.

"Elizabeth T'less of the clans Niikhirch and Archer." T'pol felt her legs go weak. The girl had already called her mother and there was no denying it. She had her fathers eyes and nose but T'pol's slender jaw and build. There was a definite air of Archer about her, in the way she stood and moved and T'pol could tell the girl spent more time with him than her.

"How…how?" The girl walked forward and reached out to take her mothers hand, sending reassuring feelings to her mother.

"Did I do something wrong, Ta-mehk?" T'pol pulled her hand away from the girl slowly as Doctor Phlox came out from one of the labs.

"I was just about to come and tell you, I got the result of the DNA test back. I'm sure you've guessed who the father is." He said quietly. T'pol nodded, looking down at the child.

"How?" She asked again.

"The same way I came about, mother." A far older, masculine voice stated and a man stepped out from the shadows afforded by the low illumination Phlox had granted the child for meditation.

"Techie!" The girl exclaimed and moved to hug his legs. "Something's wrong with mommy."

"She's just a little surprised, Lizzy. That's all. It'll pass." At that T'pol straightened, her Vulcan mask slipping into place.

"The question still remains of how you are here." Techie smiled at her.

"All will be revealed soon, mother. I'm sure they've found the Dilithium Crystals by now and Rialta will be returning with Archer. If we could retire to somewhere more private I'll explain everything." T'pol nodded and followed the older man through the doors of sickbay leaving a smiling Phlox.  
"Well this could be interesting." He said cheerily to himself and set about feeding his creatures, whistling an abstract tune he had heard one of his interns hum that morning.

_**IOIOIO**_

After the explanation Techie had given her, T'pol had been stunned into silence, it all seemed too improbable not to mention fantastical. However, she trusted him and so they waited. Six hours of waiting later the ship was back up and ready to go but Techie was adamant that they stay, otherwise Rialta wouldn't be able to find them.

"I suppose you were never meant ta be discovered, were ya?" Trip asked and Techie shook his head.

"No, if anyone on board this ship had seen me then there would have been uproar, especially you or T'pol." Trip nodded then a question occurred to him that had to be asked.

"How'd ya get here, I thought you were dead." Techie's lips lifted in a hint of a smile.

"Not quite dead, merely a paradox."

"…What?"

"I wont get into the finer points of temporal dynamics but I exist as a paradox. Since I interfered with the Enterprise in the expanse I shouldn't have existed but if I didn't exist then I couldn't have helped you therefore causing my creation…so on, so forth." Trip nodded, he thought he got his head around it but it was giving him a headache none the less.

"Paradox, right, got it, but that still doesn't explain how you got here." Before he could respond Malcolm's voice came over the intercom.

"Commander, two ships have just come in range, they're firing on each other." Everyone in the readyroom leapt to their feet and made their way onto the bridge. Techie sat at the science console and scanned the ship.

"It's Rialta and Scaron. Fire on this ship." He inputted the specs for the ship that had hailed them earlier. Once the two ship were in firing range a few well placed hits had the enemy ship turning tail and fleeing.

"Sir, the remaining ship is requesting permission to dock." Hoshi said, a hand on the Feinberg in her ear. "They said they've Captain Archer."

"Give them permission." T'pol said and Hoshi nodded.

"Docking bay two."

"You have the bridge Commander." She said to Tucker who was coming after her. He nodded begrudgingly and sat down. She and Techie entered the lift and ordered it to the Docking bay.

"It is…agreeable to see you again." T'pol said as the lift made its way to the far side of the ship.

"And you mother. I didn't think I'd ever get a chance to see father again, or you and the ship." T'pol looked up at the man beside her, he stood nearly a head taller.

"I thought you were dead, when your ship didn't break through the anomaly I…" He turned to her and smiled, barely a lift of his lips.

"I'm here now."

"…How long are you going to be staying?"

"Until we make sure you're safe. Scaron and his team came back in time to stop the Tri-Federation ever being founded and to do that they had to stop the Federation being founded." T'pol raised an eyebrow.

"You didn't mention that in the briefing." He shook his head.

"No, I didn't."

"What's the Tri-Federation?"

"An alliance of Empires. The Romulans, the Klingons and the Federation, at some point far, far in the future will join to fight against a common enemy and to prosper. The galaxy will be at peace and will flourish under the joint works of three great empires. Some loyalists don't believe in what the Tri-fed stands for and are trying to break it up. Not everyone was pleased to have one superpower controlling 58 of the known galaxy." Techie rolled his shoulders back. "You need not concern yourself with future politics. That is over eight hundred years away. The heart of the matter is that if Archer is killed then he can't found the Federations. It is through him that the other species are forced to ally and form the foundations of peace in the galaxy. That is why Rialta returned, to protect her interests in the matter." T'pol considered this as the turbolift doors opened and they made their way to the cargobay.

"She is from the future?"

"Not as far as you'd think. Maybe ten, twenty years. She was recruited by an organisation known as the Inter-Dimensional, Time and Spatial Police to stop the Loyalists in her time, I was asked to stop them in mine and when they launched an attack on this particular time line both she and I decided to pull our resources. I stayed on the ship to make sure nothing happened to you or father." T'pol paused in front of the airlock.

"What about the girl?"

"Elizabeth? From what Rialta told me, she's your youngest and with Archer's insatiable curiosity. She obviously snuck aboard Rialta's ship and got pulled into this." T'pol absorbed his words.

"…youngest?"

"You have an older son. Ten I believe. Rialta and I did not dwell on the matter as it came to a conflict of interests where your husbands are concerned." T'pol heard the lock click and the hiss of pressurisation.

"Where does Rialta fit into this? You are my son but I do not know her." Techie shrugged.

"She never told me. She simply said she's family but I do believe she was speaking figuratively. Ask her yourself, she'll be through in a moment." The doors slid open and Archer and the woman whom she presumed was Rialta stepped out.

"T'pol." Archer said, tugging against the bonds that tied his hands. "A little help?"

"You tied him up?" Techie asked, arching an eyebrow.

"Bite me." She said, running a hand through her blonde hair and showing him the two pointed ears.

"What is on your ears?"

"Prosthetics, smart ass. I hardly watered them and let them grow." He rolled his eyes.

"Ktarian humour at its best." She rolled her eyes back at him and untied Archers hand.

"So much for 'keep out of sight' and 'no contaminating the timeline'."

"My hand was forced."

"Indeed." Archer looked between the two of them.

"Someone want to tell me what's going on here?" His eyes rested on Techie a moment, brows furrowed as he tried to place where he had seen him before.

"My god…Lorian?"

"Hello Captain Archer, it is agreeable to see you again." The young half Vulcan, half human nodded to him.

"Okay, someone _really_ needs to tell me what's going on!"

_**IOIOIO**_

A/n: For those of you who didn't see E2, Lorian is the son of Trip and T'pol (He's the Vulcan with really big ears, they're huge! And of course the funky hair. I just love Lorian's hair.) The plot grows thicker, lol. Don't worry, it'll all fall into place soon. Mwahaha. (Sorry, caffine high, it'll pass.)


	4. Ebb and flow

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

**Denisud: **I'd like to hear who you think Rialta's parents are. My two beta's both have two completely different theories and are going mad over it. Lol. You'll find out who they are soon enough, I like to put a new surprise in each Chapter. No massive ones in this one but every now and again you need one to set the scene for the following chapters.

**Monica20**: Don't worry. I'll give you a new piece every Chapter and it'll eventually all make sense...hopefully.

**Romaulnfox: **Glad your enjoying it and yes, I am evil. Mwahahaha. I have no intention of stopping this story but this'll be my last update for the next three or so weeks. I'm afraid I have to go to a place where there is no computer access (Shock shock horror) so expect a super long next chapter.

**ArafelSedai**:(Drum roll) And the prize goes to...ARAFEL! Read on brave reader!

_**IOIOIO**_

Lorian reclined back on the couch in his quarters. He had been given the guest quarters on C Deck. He hadn't told them that that was where he used to live on his Enterprise, where his mother and father had lived, one of the largest crew quarters on board. It felt good to be home but also, somehow, creepy. None of the furniture or trinkets that had littered his quarters were around and it looked like a home that had been stripped bare.

_I am being too emotional. This isn't my Enterprise, this isn't my home. _He snapped to himself and reached into the small satchel he had brought with him. He pulled out a small packet of Kreyla and a book and began to read. If this had been his Enterprise his mother would be freaking at him for eating in the living room. He entertained the thought a few moments, smiling at the breech of rules she'd never know about. His father would just smile at her and put his arms around her drawling in the accent Lorian always found comforting.

"_Let the boy be, T'pol. He'll clean up after himself. Won't ya boy?"_

"_Yes Father."_

"_See, no worries. Now how about getting something to eat ourselves?" _

"_If you eat to many Kreyla, you'll give yourself a stomach upset."_

"_I wont mother. Goodbye father, goodbye mother." _

With a sigh he put the Kreyla down and opened his book. He had barely begun to read when the door chimed.

"Come in. "he called absent mindedly and realised that strewn over a couch with crumbs on his collar mightn't be the most dignified way to great someone.

"Techie?" He looked over to see Elizabeth standing in the doorway.

"What is it Lizzy?" He asked, beginning to sit up. The young girl ran over and climbed up onto the couch beside him, sitting against his side. She looked frightened and confused. Where was Rialta? Wasn't she looking after her? "What's the matter?" He asked again, putting his arm around the child. Immediately she flung herself against his side, burying her face in the soft blue material of his shirt.

"What's going on, Techie?" She mumbled into his shirt and he took her gently by the shoulders, pulling her up to face hi properly.

"What do you mean?"

"We're on Enty, right?" He nodded. "And mummy and daddy are running the ship?" He nodded again but he was beginning to realise her dilemma. "And Mally is blowing things up to keep us safe?"

"Yes, they are. Although Mister Reed is probably not blowing anything up right now." The girl shook her head.

"Why do no one recognise me. Even Foxy."

"Foxy…Phlox?" The girl nodded and Lorian shook his head. "Yes Lizzy, this is Enterprise, they are your parents and…Malcolm and Phlox but this is the past. Before you were born." He wasn't going to explain to her about time paradox' and alternate timelines. She was a smart kid but she was still two. Well, two by Vulcan standard years. She'd be closer to the age of four by Terran approximation.

"Before?" The look on her face was comical but Lorian didn't laugh. It was hard enough for him to comprehend and he was in his forties, how the hell would a four year old manage? "How we get before I was born?"

"We were sent by a friendly alien."

"Why?"

"To look after mummy and daddy." If anyone heard him speaking like this he'd never live it down but it was only him and the girl and the last thing she needed was him tossing out polysyllabic words.

He stroked her dark hair back from her face and frowned. She really did look like Archer, then again, he looked like Trip.

"What'cha readin'?" She asked, looking at the book. The words spiralled up and down the page in simple Vulcan Text. She began to read and pointed halfway down the page.

"What does that mean?"

"Sound it out." He encouraged.

"Ah-huh-rak…Ah'hrak?" He nodded, pulling her up so she could see the book easier.

"Yes, know what that is?" She furrowed her brow and thought but shook her head. "It's a place on Vulcan called the Forge, heard of that?" She nodded.

"Grumpy Vulcan took me there once. It's very dusty." Lorian smirked.

"You shouldn't call Soval 'Grumpy Vulcan'."

"Well he is!"

"He sneaks you sweets, don't think I don't know that." She blushed olive.

"Only if I pull a face like his and say nothin', and what's with him an' that box of his?" Lorian smiled.

"It's a c'thia box. I'm sure he'll explain it to you. When you complete your training then you'll get one. I have one." At this she perked up.

"Can I see?" Lorian shook his head.

"No, a c'thia box is where you put your emotions. You put them away in a little box and tuck that away so that you can control them during the day and take them out, examine them at night." The girl looked at him as if he were mad and went back to reading. When she had finished the first page she shook her head. "Do you want me to read it to you?" He asked but she shook her head.

"No…I'm…fine…Okay, I don't understand any of it. What does… vrekasht mean?"

"Outcast, someone who is not accepted."

"What's the book called?"

"The exile of Tamalas, it is a classic but perhaps a little too advanced for you. Shall I get something else?" She nodded and he reached into his bag, pulling out a padd. He cycled through a moment then handed it to her.

"This is one of my favourites. Can I read it to you?" She asked, pointing one out. He nodded to she set off on the tale of a talking le-matya. It had been his favourite as a child too though his mother had discourage such 'illogical' reading. His father always snuck him books and by the age of five he had read every Disney and Ladybird classic and memorised them. He wondered it Lizzy had read any of them and realised just how little he knew about his half sister. She was, after all, part related to him. The circumstances were a bit odd but perhaps he should make more time to get to know her, even if they would be parting ways in a week.

He wondered briefly where Rialta was, she was the little girls shadow practically. Never leaving her out of ear shot for too long, fiercely protective and careful with the girl. Like a female sehlat and her cubs. There was a low rumble in his chest at that thought which could almost have been called a chuckle but he was Vulcan, and Vulcan's do not chuckle.

_**IOIOIO**_

Rialta pinched the bridge of her nose and looked over at the four people across from her.

"I _had_ to do it. There was no two ways about it. I couldn't contact ye, imagine it. Some girl calls you up and says, "Like, hi, I'm from the future and I want you to come aboard my ship for the next few hours with no guarantee of safety, oh and yeah. Enterprise can't move from _this _very spot. Could ya just beam over? Thanks.'…Imagine what you would have done!" Trip smirked.

"When you say it that way it does sound a little far fetched." Archer sat forward, sighing and rubbing a hand over his tired face.

"Why the charade, the kidnapping, the makeup, everything?"

"Well, I needed free passage through Vulcan space so dressing up was a logical choice, that, and you weren't _supposed _to know that we were intervening but it seems to me that you know a hell of a lot more than your supposed to. Techie was supposed to stay in the shadows and make sure that the Enterprise didn't go anywhere and as for Liz? I'll have words with her later. If her mother finds out I'm toast." T'pol arched an eyebrow.

"I fail to see how my knowledge of that matter turns you into heated bread." Rialta froze. Turning to face T'pol slowly she spoke.  
"You know…about…Lizzy?" T'pol nodded. "NO! This is terrible! The whole entire timeline will be doing knots and a flips and stuff. Oh gods, I'm so dead. I'll be hung drawn and quartered for this!" She sank own into a chair, burying her face in her hands. "No, no it's okay. This might be the natural progression of things. The briefing was vague at best. This _might _be how it happens. Maybe you're supposed to know?" She shook her head. "Regardless, it's all done now. We'll have to get out of this area of space ASAP and rendezvous with an IDTSP ship, I'll get onto Techie to McGyver a temporal sensor array through your deflector dish to sense any ships not from this timeline so we'll have advanced warning if Scaron or anyone else tried to sneak up on us...With your permission of course, Captain." Archer nodded but before she could lave he held up a hand.

"Uh…Rialta?" He began. "Why do you call Lorian, Techie?"

"Oh, Techie, you know, technology, technician, technical. It's kinda a nickname cause he didn't tell me his name when I first met him but since he was wearing an Engineering uniform I began calling him Techie and the name stuck. The fact that he hates it only makes me use it more so I'd stick to calling him Lorian if I were you, otherwise he'll freak." There was a round of sniggers but T'pol merely raised an eyebrow. It was her son, technically, they were talking about. How did she go from having no children to having two? And all in a matter of hours too.

As Rialta left Archer and Trip walked with her.

"Rialta?" Archer asked.

"Yeah?"

"Why did you tell me your name was T'Rialta?" The girl shrugged.

"I dunno, sounded more Vulcan. Vulcan ladies tend to have Tuh or Vuh before their names." He nodded, taking this in and waiting for the turbolift with her.

"How do we know each other in the future?" He asked and she grinned back t him.

"I'd tell you but then I'd have to kill you." He grinned and nodded to her before moving to the Captains chair. Trip entered the lift with her.

"Rialta, can I ask you a question."

"Sure? You can ask ten if you like but I'm not going to tell you who wins the Polo match finals this year." Trip laughed and shook his head.

"Nah, I wanted to know why Elizabeth doesn't know who I am. I mean, T'pol and Archer are meh two best friends. We didn't have a fallin' out, did we?" Rialta shook her head.

"I can't answer that question, Trip. I'm sorry."

"…I die, don't I."

"I can't answer that question, I'm sorry." The turbolift stopped and she stepped out. "That was a different timeline, don't think about it. Okay?" He nodded and the turbolift doors slid shut. Trip held his head in his hands. He died? Oh god, he died. This was the second timeline where he discovered he died before he got his first grey hair. He'd have to find out how this time, then he could prevent it. If Rialta wouldn't tell him maybe the girl would. She was John's kid and if she was any bit like him then she'd know things or at least be able to find them out.

_**IOIOIO**_

"The warp trail split here. A Cardassian prison ship, an escort vessel of some kindand an unidentified vessel. The vessel that double back has too much distortion in it's wake. It might be Rialta's ship, it mightn't be." Scaron looked over at his Helm officer. He was a Bajoran and the Security Officer currently pacing restlessly next to him was a Klingon. A Vulcan monitored Communications and a human at Science. He had a crew of eighteen and not one of them was the same species as the other. Each bringing their own unique skills and properties to the team. He was up against a ship of humans with two Vulcans and a Katarian. There was no way he'd lose to them. Scaron never lost to humans, not till the founding of the Tri-Federation when he was forced to work with them. The Star Empire was destined to conquer and rule the galaxy but with the Federation and Klingons polluting it they stood no chance and would fall. He would not stand by while the foundations of everything he fought for, everything his friends and brothers _died_ for was corrupted. He would have his children stand on the home world of Vulcan and gaze upon the marvels of their beginnings under a Romulan flag. He would have them served by Terrans and commanding Klingons. His children's future was at sake and he wasn't going to let them down.

"Back track to the Enterprise. We'll find Rialta there and if not…destroy it. If I can't have Archer I'll take everything he lived for. What good is a Captain without his ship?" He sat back, running a hand along his brow ridges his species developed on the colder world of Romulus. He longed to walk the sands of Vulcan once again. It was a primal longing that ran in his veins and he would see the longing satisfied even if it meant the tides that covered the world before the awakening. The tides of blood. And he would make sure that those tides were red, not green.

**_IOIOIO_**

This wil be my last update for the month. I'm afraid I'm leaving on the 10th and wont be coming back till the 29th (My brithday. w00t!) and I'll have very little if any computer access while I'm away. So sit tight and I promise by August this fic will be back up and running circles!


	5. Maybe if she was concious

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: PG-13 (T)

Summary: Whatever the hell is on I just saw Demons…erm…What can I say but Oh dear lord. The moment she named the child I cringed in my seat. Aw, what a cute episode though, I cried (I'm such a softy). I feel so bad for T'pol, losing Liz and then Trip. Well I'll make no promises about either of them in this fic either but…You'll see. Also, my good friend Kiwi asked how I can have a Trip / T'pol / Archer dynamic all in the one fic. Well, I like both pairings about the same and I like the competition so nyah!

I can't believe Star Trek is over, an end to an era. As long as I've been alive there's been a Star Trek show running. I'm sure in about another ten years they'll revive it. They have to. Anyway, until then we'll always have fanfic and here is this one.

_**IOIOIO**_

Trip sat back and stared into the bourbon in front of him. He still couldn't get his head around the fact that he was dead. Well, not dead but…in the future dead. What did his future have in store for him? Would it be natural and inescapable or the result of an accident? Could he go back to Florida and live out a long and happy life away from the dangers of space?

_I'd get sick of it. I can't live without mah engines and it's not like Florida is safer than here. It's got the scars and tombstones ta prove it._

He put down the bourbon, knowing that if he had another glass it would only lead to more and he had duty in the morning. How would it look to Lorian if he turned up to help stinking of booze and staggering?

_Lorian, my son…then there's the little girl down in sickbay who's John's. John doesn't have any feelings for T'pol, does he? It has to be a new development. Something that happened in their timeline drew them together. My death? Well, if it makes them happy I suppose it's not too bad. After all, John is my friend, I want him to be happy...but with T'pol? Hell, is it any likelier me and she get together? We haven't been together since…since _our_ Lizzy. _

He turned back to the table with the bourbon still waiting. Walking back over, slowly and carefully he picked up the glass and looked at the amber liquid.

"Damn Charles, you've gone and fallen in love with a Vulcan." If John wanted her, he was going to have to fight for her. Trip left and went to the gym. He could hammer out his frustration on a Security Officer or two, maybe he'd go see cook in the morning too. He always knew what to say.

_**IOIOIO**_

Archer paced restlessly in his quarters. The news of Lizzies parentage and Rialta's background had proved too much of a shock. He had tried to remain calm and composed at the briefing but it was all flooding back now.

_T'pol, and I, have a daughter? She's such an angel, looks like me…but she's half Vulcan! I mean, I'm _attracted_ to T'pol but married with kids? Is she the youngest, the eldest, an only child? Am I good father, T'pol a good mother? Where do we live, what does she do for fun, have I thought her how to swim, told her stories before she goes to bed at night? My god, I'm a father!_

He sank down onto his couch and held his head. Porthos, who had been watching him from beneath a worried paw in his basket, leapt into action and up onto the couch beside him. The beagle butted his head against his master side and crawled up onto his lap, then jumped up to lick his face. Archer smiled.

"Wonder if you're still around. Does she like dogs? I know T'pol doesn't like the way you smell." The dog whined as if in protest. "If it's any consolation I don't think you smell. Not as bad as Trip anyway." He chuckled to himself and rubbed the dogs head, leaning back onto the couch. He wondered how Trip and T'pol were doing. They were probably used to this by now. He better get used to it to.

"One minute I'm a bachelor the next I'm married with kids. What is the world coming to, eh Porthos? You're lucky, you're neutered. I'm beginning to wonder if that wouldn't be easier for me too." The dog stared at him then barked, coiling up and dropping to sleep in his lap. "Didn't think you'd agree." Archer sighed, scratching the pups head. Looking over at the clock he saw it was ten. Making a decision he knew he might regret he got up off the couch and strode to the door, much to Porthos' dismay. The pup gave a yip and followed his master straight to the turbolift.

"Sickbay." He knew Liz and Rialta hadn't been allocated quarters yet and that Rialta was in sickbay so he surmised that was where Liz was too.

In the few moments it took him to reach sickbay he began to feel nauseous. At least now he had a reason to go see Phlox. He was so nervous, he had never had a daughter before…or any kids for that matter.

"And I told _you_ that it's NORMAL for my species!" The voice belonged to Rialta and was furious.

"I'd still like to keep you in over night. I've never met your species before and I'll have to do several tests to make sure the food is viable and the air, the water, the…"

"DOC ! I live on Earth, in San Francisco. Hell, I've lived all over the place, Vulcan, Andoria, _here_. I know what I can and cannot eat as well as drink, breath, touch and mate with. Please, do not act as if I were some idiot."

"Your blood pressure and temperature…"

"Are normal for my species! Phlox! I promise I'm not going to keel over and die on you." She placed her hands on Phlox' shoulders and smiled. "Promise." Phlox sighed in defeat.

"I'd still like to do some tests." Rialta just laughed.

"Oh Doc, wait another few months. K?" Phlox smiled back at her, moving away to tend to a rowdy animal in its cage.

"I presume I've no other choice. I'll see if they've allocated you quarters yet." He offered, disappearing behind the curtain to his menagerie.

"'S'alright Doc. I've got a pallet in the back of my ship." She said, her accent shifting slightly. It sounded familiar but Archer couldn't quite place it.

"Rialta, that ship is tiny. There are nice, big, beds waiting for you on Enterprise. I heard the beds in the guest room are fluffy and everything." Archer said, stepping forward and making his presence known, Elizabeth was no where to be seen.

"But I've always managed on my ship and…and…" She began, looking flustered between Phlox and Archer. It seems her defiance didn't stretch to John's word.

"I wouldn't hear of it." John said, smiling warmly. "So, where's Elizabeth?" Phlox shrugged.

"She left several hours ago and has not returned."

"Probably off poking around somewhere." Rialta mumbled, sinking back onto one of the biobeds.

"Takes after me then." Archer said proudly.

"Ye're like bloody clones. She's an Archer to the core. Thank god the boys have more sense in them and take after their mother." At this Archer froze.

"There's more." He said, not meaning it to sound so full of dread and panic but he was gaining kids like a march hare. Rialta looked up and sighed, shrugging her shoulders.

"Two, boys, nice, respectable, heartbreakers, take after their mother. I probably shouldn't be telling you this but since the timelines already up the creek without a paddle, I don't think it could hurt." Archer sat on the bed next to her, staring off into space, stunned.

"What are their names, what ages are they?" He asked, dumbfounded.

"Well, Nemat is ten and Charles is seventeen."

"Seven years difference." He mumbled. "Between them all." Then the relevance of their seven year age gaps hit him. T'pol's pon farr. "Are we happy?" He asked, suddenly concerned. All manner of terrible thoughts filling his head. Did her Pon farr come upon her forcing her to mate? Was he the only one available? Did he get her pregnant then have to marry her?

"Very, the boys are following the Vulcan path so they hide it but you spoil them and they love you for it. T'pol and you had a hard time at first but people embraced the idea of interspecies marriage a lot easier than you'd think. A lot of guys and gals were suckers for the pointy ears and blue skin. Then there was the…never mind."

"The what?" Archer asked, curious.

"A future event which will come to pass regardless of the circumstances of your life. I cannot tell you." She fell back onto the biobed and started when Porthos nosed her hand and licked it, deciding he like this new person and looking for attention. His master was too busy staring into space, speechless.

"One, now one is hard to get my head around but three? What are they like, what do they like?" She halted the flood of questions she knew was to come with a raised hand.

"Well…Charles loves water polo and isn't half bad. He is in his final year at Markham. It's a school set up near Starfleet for the children of stationed officers and offworlders and stuff. He's very good at the languages but cares little for business and math. Nemat is an avid reader, he's most of the Markham library read already. He doesn't have Charles's skill with languages but is a whiz at math and loves science. He's only in 5th class. Uh…the system is a little different to American schools. I don't know what you'd call it but he's been attending school for seven years and has one year left before he moves up to secondary education. Lizzy hasn't started school yet but already she's a good reader and avid talker. She can swim but she doesn't like the water. The boys love to swim." Rialta smiled as if recalling good memories. Archer was shocked, this was _his_ family he was hearing about. It was surreal.

"How do you fit into all of this?" Archer asked and her face fell.

"Ye found me adrift in space and took me in. I was adopted by two of your officers and raised for several years. When the war broke out and dad was called away to Captain the Seraphim, I was left alone, 'cause mom was over on Mars colony. The two of ye took me in and looked after me while they were gone. I look after Lizzy and Nemat for ye when you're called away. That's how I fit in." She sighed, petting Porthos idly. Archer was quiet and still a long moment.

He wondered who the two officers she spoke of were and was eager to know more about the war. Who went to war? Why?

"So…Trip…what's he doing?" He asked finally, trying to find a neutral topic. Rialta sighed again, closing her eyes.

"Has a little plot of land he stays in all the time, not much else to say." Archer chuckled.

"He always told me he'd get a plot of land, maybe some cows. I thought it was crazy talk, didn't think he could tear himself away from his engines."

"Indeed." She muttered. "But lets not talk of the future. Lets talk of now." She patted the bed beside her and Porthos gave it a running leap. Archer had no idea how a dog of his size cleared the distance required to get onto the bed but bless the little mutt, he did it. "Good boy." She cooed, petting Porthos' head as he climbed onto her stomach and lay down, facing her head.

"I take it I still have Porthos." He said, reaching across to affectionately scratch the dogs ear.

"Even Porthos the super dog can't live seventeen years but you had him a long time, yes. You've got two other dogs now." She smiled suddenly as if something incredibly funny struck her.

"What?" He asked, shifting on the bed to face her.

"Nothing." She giggled, trying to smother her laughter.

"What are they called?" He asked, regarding her sceptically. She let out a bark of laughter.

"Nope. I ain't telling."

"Rialta?" He asked sternly.

"Well…one's an Alsatian for protection you got off dad when you're house was broke into…the other is another beagle. The great grandson of one of Porthos' sisters." She snorted with laughter. "Really, you don't want to know what they're called."

"Try me."

"Well…did I mention you've a twisted sense of humour and…" He gave her his patented 'no nonsense' look and she sighed. "Soval and Maxwell."

"WHAT!" The comm. On the wall chiming drew him away and he moved to it.

"Archer here."

"Sir, we've re-entered Andorian space, you said to contact you the moment we did." Archer nodded.

"Thank you Ensign, Archer out." He turned back to Rialta who was laughing on the bed.

"Which is which?" She began to laugh even harder. Phlox passed by and pressed something against her arm and there was a few seconds before she fells still.

"What…creative names you chose." Phlox said, smiling over at the Captain. "That was the fifth sedative I gave her. What an interesting species. Her body seems to be able to filter most foreign substances out of the body." He turned away and resumed working on his padd. "A little rest should do her good after her long journey, and you. You never did some to see me about those marks on your wrist. Do you want me to remove them for you?" Phlox brandished the dermal regenerator like a sword and Archer stretched out his bruised wrists.

"What I need now is a bath and a good night sleep." He looked over at Rialta again and smiled. She seemed pretty happy, he must have a good life…and with T'pol of all people.

"Night Doctor."

"Good night Captain." Archer left deciding that he could see Lizzy in the morning. Charles, Nemat and Elizabeth. His kids outnumbered Trip's. That had to count for something right? He was going to have to talk to T'pol in the morning…or at least cook.

Phlox however sat down at a console.

"Well, it seems that's two dimensions I've found a way to combine Vulcan and Human DNA to create offspring and I haven't even started my work in this dimension. I better get on it right away so that when T'pol finally makes up her mind I'll have it ready." He smiled to the screen. "It'll be interesting to see who she chooses or even if she chooses them at all. I have no doubt they'll soon try to woo her. It'll be an interesting case study of Human Vulcan interrelations. Don't you agree?" He turned to smile at Rialta's prone body. "I'm sure if you were conscious you would."

_**IOIOIO**_

When Lorian woke he discovered Elizabeth curled up against him on the couch, fast asleep and twitching in her sleep. They had read for an hour until she fell asleep and Lorian, not wanting to wake her, decided that the couch was as good a place as any to sleep. He immediately regretted that fact when a vicious crick in his neck made itself known. Liz turned in her sleep as he began to shift and he had to catch the back of her powder blue tunic to stop her sliding off the side of the couch. When she remained asleep he scooped her up and transferred over into his bed. He checked the time as he tucked her in and saw it was only five in the morning. He had been asleep eight hours! If he didn't stop he'd be eating three meals a day too, like a human.

Elizabeth murmured in her sleep and cuddled into the pillow before slipping back into a deep sleep. Lorian had always wanted a brother or a sister but an accident in an abandoned repair station had rid him of any hope of that when he was just a boy. It was strange. By his calculations he should already have been born on Enterprise. It had been five years since he encountered Enterprise and he was born on the fourth year of their journey. He wondered if the knowledge of his parentage had affected their relationship in a bad way, they didn't seem as close as he remembered them being…granted, they weren't married with a child in this timeline…well, they weren't married anyway…yet.

He knew his father would want to help and he also knew that he wouldn't be anyway conscious until at least seven. When Trip did sleep, he slept like the dead. Lorian didn't want to expose him to any more technology from the future than strictly necessary. Their contamination of the time line had been abominable but it didn't matter. The IDTSP had the ability to wipe the memories of everyone on board or even erase what they did on the timeline, but only if they were successful. He wondered if his parents would be allowed remember he was there, or even if he would. With an organisation like them then you never knew. He still didn't understand why he and Rialta were sent and not proper IDTSP Agents. He knew they existed and were brutally efficient. They were only founded in the 28th century and were not allowed mess with the timeline like people like Daniels and the blue aliens but they repaired the holes left by them. Lorian had actually witnessed a Vulcan / Human First Contact where Sevak was _shot_ by Cochrane! He was told that that timeline would be obliterated by a man name Riker and Geordi soon so it wouldn't matter but that was just one of the abominations of the cast off timelines he saw.

He was determined not to let this timeline fall into chaos and anarchy like all the others. There were very few stable timelines, his not one of them, and he was determined to see this one survive.

"Sleep tight." He mumbled pulling the blanket up to the girls chin and tucking it back in after she rolled and kicked most of the duvet off. With that done he changed his shirt and marched out into the corridor. He made his way straight to the docking bay where Rialta had arrived with Archer.

The ship was tiny but faster than anything Lorian could even imagine. It had warp nine as _standard_ and the ability to go _faster_. He'd gone warp seven and thought he was the fastest thing in the galaxy. When you stood on her ship it was like you weren't even moving at all but the configuration was bizarre and the controls futuristic. He had no idea how to work it and he was pretty sure she didn't either but somehow she got it to move and all that really mattered was that Lorian know that the supplies he needed were in a locker in the floor.

Upon stepping into the ship he heard the beeping of the console and ran to it. It was lit up like a Christmas tree. They were being surrounded by cloaked ships out of temporal sync. "Scaron." He breathed, followed by the very unvulcan statement "Oh shit."


	6. 36 degrees and rising

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

A/N: Sorry about the last chapters summary. For some reason it didn't come out properly. Ah well, here is the next chapter, enjoy.

_**IOIOIO**_

Scaron saw the Enterprise hanging out in space, completely unaware they were being surrounded. The ships he commanded were from all across the timelines he'd vanquished in pursuit of the perfect timeline. A timeline where the Empire was strong and prosperous. But the Federation was like a cancer that ate at the Empires foundations. Picard and his ideals, PAH! And if it wasn't the Federation it was the Klingons. Little more than uncouth barbarians with ideals of honour and loyalty that were as perverted as the Ferengi's view on latinum.

"The last of the ships are in place." He looked over to the Vulcan at Comm. and nodded.

"Alright. Send a message to…" He was cut off by the human at science.

"Sir…Enterprise, it's…disappearing!"

"What?" He shot up off his chair and watched as Enterprise shimmered and disappeared.

"They've…they've disappeared into the temporal null. Sir, if we follow them in then…"

"I know!" Scaron snapped. "I know." He sank back into the chair and steepled his fingers. "When they re emerge they will have to renter the timeline here. We will wait. After all…we have all the time in the world."

_**IOIOIO**_

Lorian sighed with relief as the little dots blinked out. All he did was place a hand on the controls and suddenly the ship powered up and began to glow brightly, then it died as suddenly as it had started. The red alert sounded all over the ship and Lorian left the shuttle bay and made his way to the bridge. What had he done now?

_**IOIOIO**_

"I sleep for seven hours and THIS is what happens?" Archer swallowed a laugh and looked at the chastised Lorain who was the object of her fury. "For the love of Surak, can I not even catch forty winks without someone fiddling with my stuff?"

"I merely placed my hand on the console. You did not tell me it ran on mental commands." Rialta closed her eyes, her mouth working open and close for several seconds.

"Why? Why were you in the ship and why were you at the console? If you give me a good reason I may not self combust. Go." Lorian smirked.

"I was merely retrieving some parts for the sensors when I heard beeping from the console, I approached it and saw Scaron's Bird of Prey and several smaller vessels surrounding the ship. I placed my hand on the console and they disappeared." Rialta nodded through his story and sighed.

"Alright, okay…you are aware that when we renter the temporal line he'll be waiting for us? Right? Unless we stay here for the next thousand years in which case a whole hour will have passed in the timeline and he might get bored." At this T'pol perked up.

"What is the difference between normal space and this region of space?" She asked, looking at the readings, or lack thereof, on the padd.

"This isn't space, this is time. We are in the temporal null. Literally, day 0 of the universe. There is nothing here, not anti matter, matter or…anything. There's just nothing here. Time doesn't move here and the longer we stay here the more we'll be affected. We'll start noticing the computers getting sluggish then hot food getting cold fast or staying hot really long and it's only a matter of time before…well…we lose matter and time and we cease to exist."

"How long to you estimate that will take?" T'pol asked and at this Rialta smiled.

"There is no time here. I can't say. It'll just happen and we probably wont even notice. The temporal null is unlike anything you can explain. It has no rules. It has no time! Maybe if we convince ourselves that time is still flowing properly we can stay here indefinitely, but time has stopped and it affects linear beings strangely. I don't know what to do!" Trip finally sat up and spoke.

"Can't we just transport ourselves back using your ship?" Rialta shook her head.

"No, sorry, the powercells are totally depleted. They can't recharge in the null, power is weird in the null."

"Couldn't we find someway to hook up Enterprises power systems to your ships?" Archer asked, looking out the window into a voidless sky.

"What, you mean like use the Enterprise as a..a…" She faltered a moment and put a hand to her temple.

"Are you alright?" Lorian asked, half rising to aid her.

"I'm fine." She shook her head, brushing Lorian off and looked back to Archer. "You mean use the Enterprise like a battery, right?"

"Something like that." Archer saw T'pol shift uncomfortably out of the corner of his eyes  
and Phlox, who was at the end of the table, was fast asleep.

"I'll get on it right away." Trip said, standing up and motioning to Lorian.

"You'll need my help." Rialta said and stepped forward but ended up stumbling into Lorian's arms.

"Rialta? Are you sure you're alright?" She jerked out of his arms and brushed herself down.

"I'll be fine, it'll pass, it's just the null. It'll have some strange effects." She turned and walked stiffly out the door. Trip cast a look at him and shrugged his shoulders before following her out leaving Archer, T'pol and a now snoring Phlox at the table.

"T'pol, are you alright?" She was flushed green and breathing deeply.

"I'll be fine. I'll aid Commander Tucker." She got up and walked towards the door but Archer reached out and grasped her arm. She gasped as their skin came in contact and jerked away, looking at him as if he had just grown into a monster before she promptly left.

"That was…odd." He said, standing in the briefing room alone. His stomach ached and he realised he hadn't breakfast yet. He'd see what cook had made then sit in the Captain chair, because it seemed he had very little else to do.

_**IOIOIO**_

Lizzy stirred in her bed restlessly for a few moments before rising and making her way into the bathroom. She was tall for her age but still didn't even reach the top of the sink in height. With the some acrobatics only a child could perform she found herself on top of the sink, perched on the edge of the basin. With a bit of fumbling she managed to turn on the tap and half fill the basin. Careful not to spill any over the edge she began the task of washing her hands and face meticulously. Her mom was a stickler for hygiene, dad didn't care as much as mom but Rialta was a little afraid of T'pol and impressed the great need for cleanliness on her. Once she had her hands, arms and face scrubbed well she hopped down from the sink and began working her jaw. The dental fluids that filled her mouth were nice and tasted vaguely of almonds but she knew better than to try and swallow it, instead she swirled it around her mouth and spat it into the toilet, leaving a large purple stain from the fluid. She smiled at the mirror to examine her teeth before she returned to the main room. She opened the closet and dismayed at seeing only adult clothes, her own were wrinkled from sleeping in them and everything in the wardrobe was miles too big for her. If she understood Lorian correctly then this was before she was born and daddy wouldn't have clothes for her in his wardrobe, neither would mommy who, for a strange reason, kept a different quarters on Enterprise…or at least did. Enterprise was decommissioned long before Lizzy was born but she had been told stories by Uncle Mal about how they used to have polls on who'd catch Archer sneaking in and out of T'pol's quarters. T'pol was never caught, she was just too Vulcan to be caught. She wondered briefly why Uncle Mal looked so different. His hair was a different colour and he looked so grumpy all the time. Maybe he hadn't met Aunty Mal yet, he was always smiling around her. Using the reasoning of a child she decided to go look for Aunty Mal so that Uncle Mal could smile again.

She made her way out into the corridor and looked around.

"Computer," She said loudly and when it didn't respond she sighed. This was before voice activation obviously. How was she supposed to find Aunty Reed now?

"Hey they skipper." She looked over to see Trip coming down the corridor towards her and looked around to see if Malcolm was with him but he was alone. "Where are you off to?" Trip asked, coming to crouch down beside her.

"Where's Aunty Reed?" She asked and Trip stopped.

"What, Malcolm?" He asked confused. Liz turned back to him, her eyebrows in her hairline.

"No…Malcolm is Uncle Mal, I'm looking for Aunty Mal." A slow smile spread across Trip's face and he beckoned her closer.

"What's Aunty Reed's _first_ name. Are you sure she's on the ship?" Liz smiled and nodded.

"Course. This is where they met, like mommy and dad." Trip grimaced at that. John and T'pol. He didn't like the sound of that.

"What department is she in and what's her name?" Lizzy smiled up at him but before she could answer Hoshi came around the corner and Lizzy giggled with delight.

"AUNTY HOSHI!" She ran up and wrapped her arms around the woman's legs causing Hoshi to beam and bend down to pick her up.

"Hello there, where did you come from?" The girl giggled again and wrapped her arms more firmly around Hoshi.

"I'm hungy." She moaned into Hoshi's shoulders and the Comm. Officer smiled.

"Well, I was just on my way to the Messhall. Let's see if Cook can get you something, okay?"

"YEAH!" She jumped down from Hoshi's arms and grabbed her hand, pulling her along.

"BYE TRIP!" Hoshi shouted over her shoulder, laughing with the eager child.

Trip's eyes narrowed as they followed the child. She looked so much like John it was uncanny but there was this underlying hint of T'pol that would no doubt show itself in her later years. There was no doubt that she would grow up to be a beautiful young woman with all of T'pol's grace and beauty and this irked Trip more than he could bare. He shouldn't judge this child by her parents but the idea of John and T'pol was burning in his mind worse and worse and worse and this child was a testimony to that dark thought in his mind.

_Is that what John felt when he found out about Lorian?_ Trip wondered briefly as he made his way down the corridor to Engineering to work on the rig from his end.

Hoshi, however, took an instant warming to the child. She didn't know who the girls parents were and presumed she came with the new woman who had come on board but she reminded her of John when he was younger. Before the Expanse. Bright eyed, bushy tailed and peering into every crack and crevice with a childlike wonder that fused the smile onto Hoshi's face.

"What's you name?" She asked the little girl when they came to the Mess and the girl beamed up.

"Elizabeth T'less but everyone calls me Lizzy." She said, hopping into a chair by the dark porthole.

"My name's Hoshi. What do you want to eat?" The girl peered out for a few minutes then turned back and shrugged.

"Not meat." She offered, unsure of what they had to offer and open to suggestions.

"I'll see if I can get you some cereal then, okay?" The girl nodded and resumed looking out the window.

"Where'd the stars go?" She asked and Hoshi shrugged.

"I don't know, must be an anomaly…now where did _cook_ go?" The chef that usually inhabited the kitchen was no where to be seen so Hoshi pottered around herself, looking for something to eat. She made a sandwich for herself and poured out a bowl of Enty-O's. It was basically NX shaped fruitloops put in a silly looking box with chef on the front. It was a joke from the kitchen staff from when they were in space dock. They had ordered a crate of them for the ships eight year of service only two weeks before . It may be the tackiest cereal ever but they tasted pretty good.

"Here you go." She said, putting the bowl in front of the child and sitting across from her.

"Thank you Aunty Hoshi." Hoshi.

"Do I know you?" She asked, peering at the girl.

"You're daddies friend, Hoshi." The girl said, digging into the cereal with enthusiasm.

"Who's your daddy?" Hoshi asked, confused. Who was this child? The girl looked up and giggled, shaking her head. "Well then, can I guess?" The girl nodded, smiling.

"…The man who came on board today?" She shook her head.

"No, not Techie." She said with a mouthful of cereal.

"…Erm…is it someone on the ship?" The girl nodded once, smiling at her little game. Since Hoshi had first encountered the child with Trip it was a good place to start.

"Is it…Trip?" A shake was the child's only response and Hoshi thought for a moment, staring at the girls elfin face. She was obviously not human, the ears and green complexion gave it away, but there were no Vulcan males on the ship…only T'pol…the child's resemblance to John was uncanny. What if…

"Is it…is it Captain Archer?" The girl nodded.

"Lizzy Archer!" She said, patting her own head. "You're my Aunty Hoshi!"

All the colour drained from her face. How could such a thing be possible.

"How old are you, Lizzy?" Without looking up Lizzy held up three fingers. Hoshi wracked her brains for any possible way this child could be John and T'pols…none came to mind. T'pol hadn't taken any extended leave of absence or shown any signs of pregnancy, those catsuits she sported definitely would have shown _any_ sign.

"Lizzy, who's your mom?" The child chewed for a moment then swallowed.

"T'pol." She said, looking up at Hoshi. "Don't worry, it's'kay if ya don't know. I'm not born yet." Hoshi raised a single, slim eyebrow.

"Sorry, say that again?"

"I said, I'm not born yet. Lorian told me that I travelled backwards in time to before when daddy and mommy had me or Charles or anyone."

"Charles?"

"My big brother." Hoshi dropped her sandwich and stared at the child in shock.

"You're from the future?" Lizzy nodded. "How far in the future?" The young girl shrugged.

"I dunno, twenty years I guess cause Charlie isn't born yet and he had his twentieth Birthday a while ago." She said, taking another spoonful of cereal. "We had cake!" She added on suddenly as if this made all the difference.

"What's it like in the future?" Hoshi asked, curiosity niggling at her heels.

"Techie says I shouldn't tell you." The girl said, looking up at Hoshi seriously and Hoshi nodded understandingly.

"Alright, but can you tell me one thing, Lizzie? Can you tell me my name?" The girl raised an eyebrow, confused by the question.

"You're Hoshi…Hoshi Sato-Reed." Hoshi's jaw dropped.

"What?"

"You're Uncle Mal's wife, Aunty Mal. He looks grumpy, you should cheer him up. He always smiles when you're around." John chose that moment to walk in.

"…Captain…what's going on around here?" Archer sighed and moved to the replicator for some coffee. He cast a look between Hoshi and Lizzy who gave him a cereal filled smile.

"Hoshi, it's a very, very long story…but I suppose we've plenty of time."

_**IOIOIO**_

Lorian watched Rialta surreptitiously out of the corner of his eyes. She didn't look well, in fact, she looked as if she should be on her death bed rather than the crawl space between two power conduits.

"Rialta, I was talking with Doctor Phlox before I came up here. He wanted to know something about you." Lorian said conversationally as he began rerouting main power.

"Oh? What?" She asked, putting down the hydraspanner and turning onto her side to face Lorian as best she could. Considering her legs were halfway up the opposite wall and she was half standing on her head it was quite a sight.

"He wanted to know what your average body temperature was." Lorain said, watching her and wondering what her reaction would be.

"What an odd thing to ask, too bad you didn't know." She said, returning to her work.

"30 degrees." She froze, spanner half way to the restraining bolt of the pressure gauge.

"How did you know that?"

"When I first met you, you were talking with Doctor Ichabod. He said you were running a fever at 34 degrees. He wanted to get you back to thirty. I'm guessing that's you average."

"It's 31 but close enough. Why is this relavent?"

"Rialta, you're running a temperature of 36. That's hotter than a Vulcan. What's happening to you and don't tell me it's the null, this was going on before we entered this region of space." Rialta's eyes took on the look of a cornered animal that had just been wounded. Afraid, confused and maybe even a little dangerous.

"It's nothing. Never mind. Get on with your work. I want to get out of the null as soon as possible." She turned away, deliberately turning her back on him and he returned to his work. They had a seven hour job ahead of them and then they had to prepare the ship for battle against a superior foe that outnumbered them. He had plenty of time to figure out what Rialta was hiding…and she _was_ hiding something.

**_IOIOIO_**

A/N: Another chapter, another secret, another plot peice. My, my. I have been drinking to much caffine. No more Jolt for me! Anyway, drop me a line, tell me what you think, demand this faster and more sensical. (My stories making sense? Never!) Nah, I'm joking. Don't worry, the story line will pick up a lot faster here on in and it'll start to make more sense (I hope) pretty soon. Anyway, the sooner I finish this Authors Note the sooner I can post this so...Huzzah! (Yes...Waaaay too much caffine.)


	7. What have you done?

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

**Gammara**: Okay, I knew I shoulda been clearer on this. Charles, Nemat and Lizzy are John's kids, Lorian is Trip's. Rialta is...complicated but she's not one of T'pol's kids. She just looks after Lizzy as a favour to Archer. Her 'parents' are on the ship but I'm staying quiet on that one. All will be revealed soon but as my friend said when he read this 'I'm an evil cow who has an obsession with plot twists, cliff hangars and Vulcans' Which is kinda true I suppose: )

**Rose68**: I'm always worried about bringing in Oc's to fics asI dread the evil Mary-Sue (hiss) If you were worried about Rialta before thenI suggestyou give this chapter a skip because by the end of it you'll be biting your nails. As for T'pol...wellI have this habit of answering a question then asking two more. What can I say, I suppose I am just evil : )

_**IOIOIO**_

T'pol lay on her bed, staring at the wall. She had been in her room nearly an hour and no one had paged. With the ruckus of recent events she wasn't surprised but that didn't quell the fear deep in the pit of her stomach. Something wasn't right, ever since she had entered the null she had been feeling odd. Though she had eaten a light brunch only an hour before the briefing she found her stomach clenching with unfamiliar hunger pangs. She had slept seven long hours and meditated for two more yet now she was exhausted beyond all belief…then there was what happened during the briefing. It had started as a warm feeling in her stomach, she presumed it was just the hunger pangs easing off, but it had spread, enveloping her body in an uncomfortable prickly heat. The air became thick and unbreathable around her, like she was submerged in water and her eyesight had failed her, dissolving in a flurry of painful white dots. The panic that rose up inside her even now at the thought of what had happened made her shiver and she could only imagine how she appeared in the briefing. When it had ended she had only been too happy to flee...and then he had touched her. The moment his skin had come in contact with hers, a fire had enveloped her body and if it had lasted a second longer she was sure she would have burned up there and then. She didn't know what it was but what T'pol did know was that she was going to avoid Archer as long as possible.

Or would she?

She had to admit that although the sensation was foreign and frightening there was a familiarity about it. Something that she associated not with fear but with something else…something…something she didn't fear yet couldn't place. Before she could delve too deep into thought and track the source of the familiarity her door chimed.

Sitting up and straightening her uniform she ordered them to 'come' and in stepped Archer. Immediately she cringed. She didn't need this, not now.

"Captain?" She croaked as her throat tightened.

"T'pol, I was wondering if we could talk." He looked as uncomfortable as she felt so she decided to indulge him and gestured to the chair across from her. "T'pol, I've been talking to Elizabeth…err…our daughter."

"I know who you are talking about." T'pol said, a twitch of her eyebrow. He was hardly talking about Queen Elizabeth, a woman Malcolm Reed often referenced.

"Well, uh…As you know she's our youngest child in this future…we have two older boys. Charles and Nemat." T'pol's eyebrow shot up.

"Nemat?"

"Yes, does that name mean something to you?"

"Yes, that was my brothers name. He was killed by a wild Sehlat during his kahn-swan." John nodded, swallowing uncomfortably. He seemed unwilling to carry on so T'pol picked up for him. "So we have three children? Two boys and a girl?" John nodded.

"Yeah, Charles is the eldest. He's Seventeen and Nemat is only ten." T'pol nodded, taking in this information. Finally she spoke.

"Why are you telling me this?" She asked and saw John shrug, looking more uncomfortable than ever.

"I don't know. Lizzy's been asking for you a lot. She's with Hoshi now. I don't' know what she said to her but Hoshi's been as distracted as Porthos in a kitchen." He chuckled and sat back, relaxing slightly but regarding T'pol with a sceptical eye. "You're not comfortable with this, are you?"

"No."

"The fact that we have children?" T'pol shook her head.

"It's the fact I have children at all. On Vulcan having three children is considered a large family and a blessing…I'm now up to five and I haven't even been pregnant yet! It is…It is distressing." She said at last, her voice cracking. "I can't deal with this, I just can't!" John could see her shaking and the distress on her face was evident. All vestige of emotional control slipped from her and she fell to the floor, gasping for air as it turned to soup in her throat, reaching blindly out for some purchase of the real world as she felt herself slipping further and further into her own mind…Then she felt it. A hand grasping her own and another on her shoulder. A knee lightly touching her side and a worried face over her. Now she remembered where she felt this…Koss. During their bonding ceremony. The Pon Farr that culminated beneath the surface of cool logic that every male put forward had burned within her as his mind sought that of its mate. The prickly heat that ran up her skin had nothing to do with the heat of Vulcan's rising sun and all to do with the primal urge that drew a man and a woman together. She could not enter Pon Farr herself, not without being bonded to a male or unless she had not conceived a child till her one hundredth birthday, then her mind would automatically begin the mating cycle but she was only sixty six years old and no longer bonded to a Vulcan. Why was her body acting like this, like a mate of a male in Pon Farr? If the bond between her a Koss were still active, or even between her a Trip, she wouldn't feel it like this, not like this. She had to regain control, had to find some way to cool the fire that swept over her, turning her logic to ash. No matter what the cost…

_**IOIOIO**_

Trip swung the bread roll in his hands into the air and caught it on its downward arc. To the outside observer he looked rather content. Whistling some abstract tune he was sure he heard off Phlox, he looked like he did most other days. But most other days he wasn't about to have a conversation with the love of his life that could change their relationship forever. He tore a chunk out of the tiny bread roll and stepped into the turbolift where Malcolm was already waiting.

"Good morning Commander." He said yawning.

"Malcolm, it's two in the evenin'. Mornin' came and went." The look on Malcolm's face would have been comical is it wasn't for the genuine horror in the Brit's eyes.

"What? That's impossible. That means I'm six hours late for duty! I'm never late for duty! How could this have happened." Trip took a step away from the agitated Tactical Officer.

"Calm down, Mal. It's alright. We're in a temporal anomaly. This is meh lunch, a bread roll, you know what I usually have for lunch? As much as I can but I don't feel hungry. You know how strange that is, Mal, I'm usually the first to devour everything on the table."

"A temporal anomaly? Why wasn't I informed?" Trip thought back and realised he hadn't been at the meeting with them at midday."

"Mal, you know that kid we found in Archer's closet?" Malcolm nodded. "Guess who she is?"

"His illegitimate daughter?" Malcolm asked, meaning it as a joke.

"Bingo."

"…" Malcolm turned slowly, abject horror frozen onto his face. "What?" the doors slid open at Deck Five, where T'pol's quarters were.

"Ask Hoshi ta fill you in…Oh, wait. Does she know? Damn, this place has been scattered since we entered the null. The Captain will probably have a full Bridge Crew briefing or somethin' but most of this is classified…probably. You know, go talk with the Captain. I'm sure he'll tell you what ya need ta know an' all. Now, I gotta go talk with the Commander." He stepped out, giving Malcolm a little wave and tossing the last half of the bread roll towards him.

"I'll see ya later, Mal." He said, ringing the door chime and waiting for T'pol to enter. What he heard shouting from behind the door and then a loud thud.

"MAL! GET OVER HERE!" Trip shouted. "Enter your Security override!"

"What, why?" Malcolm asked, confused.

"NO! THAT'S AN ORDER LIEUTENANT!" Malcolm keyed in the override and the door slid open. What he saw was _not_ what he expected at all. While Trip ran in to intervene Malcolm moved to the Comm.

"Reed to Phlox, medical emergency, Commander T'pol's quarters."

_**IOIOIO**_

Lorian paced worriedly behind Phlox, the only sign of impatience in the halfling was his incessant course of wall to wall in sickbay, otherwise his face was calm enough to do T'pol proud.

"I have run a check and there is nothing in our data base on Katarians. The only thing we know is that the Tellarite used to conduct trade with them before the Klingon Empire's borders encompassed it. All we have is physical and some basic biological information I recorded when she came in. I'm sorry, Lorian." Lorian stopped his pacing and turned to face Phlox. His eyebrows were drawn together and forehead creased with evident worry.

"If she gets much hotter it could have fatal consequences for her. I may not know much about her physiology but she's already 5 degrees too hot and as far as I can tell it shows no sign of abating. She's running a fever that should have her bed ridden and she's hardly even sweating."

"Perhaps it is a natural biological occurrence." Phlox offered. Lorian nodded, resuming his pacing.

"I thought of that, if she were a Vulcan then I would have an educated idea of what was happening to her but…"

"But she's not Vulcan." Phlox finished, sighing. "I'm sorry, Lorian, I just don't know. Do Katarians have a mating cycle?"

"Not that I know of." Lorian said, shaking his head. He sank down onto the edge of a biobed, running a hand through his shortly hair. "She wont tell me what's wrong but I know she's worried. Perhaps it is some social mores that prevent her from telling me but if it threatens her life we have to do something."

"Try not to worry." Phlox said, forcing a smile. "I'm sure it's nothing. Who knows, the fever may break on its own. It hasn't had any other detrimental effects. It could be perfectly natural."

"Could be?" Lorian sighed. "You know, Doctor, sometimes I find Rialta brings out the human in me. I'm so worried about her I'm distracted and all she does is try and push me away. She's begun acting strange, hostile, defensive. The only other time I know of people acting like this is during the Vulcan mating cycle…and that kills." Phlox nodded, seeing the same look in Lorian's eyes as he had seen in countless others who had graced his sickbay. Sitting by the beds of those they cared about, worried, helpless…afraid.

"Perhaps…" Phlox began, half raising.

"Yes?" Lorian's head raised, hope flickering in his eyes for the first time since he had entered sickbay nearly fifteen minutes before, though it was hard to judge time in the anomaly.

"Her ship…That would have records on Katarian physiology, wouldn't it?" Lorian nodded, a half smile gracing his lips.

"You're right Doctor." Something dawned on him and his smile faded. "But all the power cells are burned out."

"Couldn't you just…I don't know, take out a memory cell or something?" The Doctor asked but Lorian just shook his head.

"It runs on bineural circuitry that is incompatible with this ships software."

"There has to be some way to interface it with our ship, how else would you be rigging power?" Lorian shrugged.

"I could try but I don't have much time, I told Rialta I was checking in with my father, if I spend to much time away she may come looking for me."

"Oh I'm sure she's just glad you've stopped proctoring her." Lorian raised an eyebrow.

"Proctor, Doctor? Certainly not, I am merely…keeping an eye on her."

"A close eye, a very close eye." Phlox chuckled. "Don't worry Lorian, I understand how Vulcan's get when someone they care about is hurt. I've watched T'pol and countless other Vulcan's hovering for too many years to believe all that about 'no emotions' or…what is it you call it, Arie-manure?"

"Arie'mnu, the mastery of passion and emotion."

"It's still Arie-Manure as far as I'm concerned. Don't worry, I'll do everything I can and I very rarely fail to solve a problem once it catches my attention…and this has my full attention." This seemed to relieve some of Lorian tension and he rose.

"I'll make my way to her ship now and see if I can…" He was cut off by the comm.

"_Reed to Phlox, medical emergency, Commander T'pol's quarters."_ Phlox moved over to the communications panel and pressed a button.

"On my way, Lieutenant." He grabbed his field medical kit and headed towards the door, Lorian in tow. "I thought you were going to go to the ship?" Lorian faltered, torn between his duty to his mother and to his friend.

"I'm sure this will not take a moment, I wish to see what is wrong with my mother."

"It may not be your mother at all. Mr. Reed said that the emergency was in T'pol's quarters, not necessarily T'pol. I'll comm. you if something serious has happened, rest assured young man, I'm sure it's nothing." Lorian nodded and headed towards the hangar at the base of the ship where Rialta's shuttle was situated. Once there he entered and immediately saw Rialta slouched over the console, unconscious. He pulled her off the console and an empty hypo went rolling across the floor.

"Rialta, what have you done?"

_**IOIOIO**_

A/N: Oh how I love cliff hangars...even if I am a little afraid of heights...oh...get me down from here! (whimper) anyway, sorryI took so long to update, an inconvenient thing called life has been dragging me away from my beloved computer a lot lately, sometimes for hours at a time. (My precious! No!) thank you all for your reviews, you guys are the best (Mexican Wave) and yes, once again I am on a caffeine high...I think there are gnomes after me. I better run and hide...(Flees)


	8. Half life

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

A/N: I am so sorry I haven't updated in so long but a little trouble saw me without any way to get onto fanfiction net. I would have posted this earlier in the month but one thing went wrong after another and everything held me back. My posts are probably going to be a lot slower coming than before but I hope to have my posts back to weekly before the end of the year. We're half way through the fic now so there's no way I'm just going to drop it. Still, a thousand more apologies and now…le fic.

**Gammara**: The Pon Farr smack down. Lol! I love it! Genius.

**Tata**: As far as I'm concerned he should bare it all but ah well. I do read over these before I post them for mistakes but there's always a few that escape me. Drives me mad. I'll probably read it through from the start soon and update the chapters. Silly grammar and spelling mistakes like that always irk me too.

_**IOIOIO**_

Lorian checked for a pulse and found one, thready and erratic. Judging by the sickly pale pallor off Rialta's face she had gotten a lot worse since he last saw her and to his horror, her chest wasn't rising and falling nor was a wisp of breath escaping her lips. She wasn't breathing!

Not knowing much about Katarian physiology he just had to play it by ear and do what he would if it were his mother or father downed.

"Alright Rialta, let's just hope this works." Pinching her nose he sealed his mouth over hers and felt her chest rise beneath his arm. When he took his head away he checked for breath. Nothing. He repeated the process again then checked her breathing but found no change. Her pulse, however, was weakening and fast. "Rialta, what have you done? What have you done?" He whispered fervently before he administered another two breaths and checked her pulse. Nothing. "NO!" He put his hands on the place he figured her heart to be, knowing it could be dangerous but if he didn't do something she'd die.

He started chest compressions, fifteen compressions, then two breaths. She was still deathly pale and not breathing on her own. "Come on, Rialta, please, come on." Fifteen more compressions and two breaths later the doors to the cargobay opened and Hoshi Sato walked in, Lizzy in tow.

"HOSHI! GET PHLOX!" He shouted across the bay from where he knelt in the ship. "RIALTA'S HEART HAS STOPPED! SHE'S DIEING" He heard Lizzy give a strangle cry and saw he try and run towards the shuttle, Hoshi grabbed her shoulder and forced her out of the shuttle bay as she ran. Lorian tried another fifteen compressions and two breaths but to no avail. It wasn't working! He wasn't doing it right!

"Oh Rialta, please, please!" His throat tightened and nose burned as he forced away the tears that threatened. He hadn't cried since his father died when he was but a boy and now was no time to restart that old habit. He grabbed the hypo and checked the contents for any hint of what she had done to herself. The vial was unmarked. It could have been poison for all he knew. "Why have you done this? _What_ have you done?" His reply was nothing more than a prone body, unresponsive and still. He grabbed her roughly by the chin and tilted her head back, prepared to administer another two breaths when he noticed something. A silvery vein on her neck was throbbing, pulsing with life. He placed his finger against it was greeted with a painstakingly slow pulse. Her chest still wasn't rising and falling so he administered a breath and heard a rattled cough as she came to, her hand flying to his face to push him away midway through the second breath.

"What are you doing?" She croaked, looking up at him with a puzzled expression. Lorian couldn't speak. He was both angry and elated at the same time as Rialta looked at him, trying to push herself off the floor, her breath rattling in her chest and movements slow and lethargic. Lorian couldn't help himself and he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close. Her body was horribly cold, a testimony to just how close he had come to losing her. "What?" She whispered into his ear.

"Your heart stopped, you weren't breathing." He said, it coming out more as a sob. His Vulcan's controlled battled vainly with his human instincts and he just held her closer, rocking her slightly. "I thought I was going to lose you." She didn't say anything, merely lay still and when he looked down he realised she had lost consciousness. He placed a kiss against her forehead and lay her down, reluctant to leave her body but knowing he had to comm. sickbay. As he reached for the comm. He saw the data she had up on the view screen. It was a medical report on Katarians – she was researching her symptoms. Apparently she didn't know what was happening to her either but the computer did and it had recommended the medicine that had probably been in the hypospray. As Lorian read his mouth fell open and he looked down at Rialta. It seemed that he'd have to do a little more than CPR if he wanted to make sure she stayed alive...

_**IOIOIO**_

Meanwhile, about five decks above, another battle for life was just beginning. Both T'pol and Archer were unconscious on the floor. T'pol looked as if she had just run the Olympic 500 meter and John looked like the victim of a car crash. Blood poured from his ears and nose and he had angry red marks where T'pol's fingers had been adhered to his face. Trip had no idea what had transpired, only a vague idea but he didn't like what he had seen. Why had T'pol forced a mind meld on John? It was a question he'd have to wait to be answered, he had more important things to tend to now. Scooping T'pol up in his arms he cradled her close to him gently, she was almost like a rag doll in his arms and her tiny elfin face was pale and covered in a clammy sweat. This immediately struck Trip as odd for Vulcans didn't sweat like humans did, they let off heat through their ears and glands on the back of their necks and down their spines. Placing his hand against her forehead Trip found her cool and clammy to the touch and her eyelids flickered open a second.

"Trip?" She gasped, her arm coming up to grip his shoulder. He didn't notice what she was doing till too late and he crumpled to the floor, T'pol tumbling out of his arms onto the floor where she remained still. Malcolm and Lt. Kiami, who were carrying the Captain out under Phlox' supervision almost dropped their captain to rush to Trip and T'pol's aid. Thankfully, Malcolm had more presence of mind and lowered him to the floor gently while the Engineering Ensign ran to his CO.

"He's out cold." He reported as Phlox ran the scanner over T'pol.

"She's already begun Plak Tow, her body is burning up and excreting vital bodily fluids in an effort to compensate. We have to get her to sickbay now or she'll die." Malcolm immediately moved to pick her up and carried her into the turbolift with Phlox and Kiami dragging John and Trip. Kiami called the turbo lift and when it opened it revealed Hoshi trying to battle a enraged Lizzy. 

"WANNA GO! WANNA GO! WANNA GO!" She screamed, twisting out of Hoshi's grasp at last only to run straight into Malcolm. Upon seeing Archer, T'pol and Trip unconscious she quietened. "Oh…they dead too?"

"Too?" Malcolm said immediately, "What happened?"

"Rialta is in the cargobay with Lorian. He said her heart stopped and was doing CPR." Phlox looked thoroughly harassed for a moment.

"Get them to sickbay! I'll be right along." Phlox ordered, moving to the nearest Comm. and comming Lorian asking for a status update on Rialta.

"We're in sickbay, Doctor. She's alive for now but I have discovered the cause of her symptoms. Has the emergency at my moth…at commander T'pol's quarters been resolved?" Phlox muttered something under his breath in Denoblian. "Sorry Doctor, I didn't quite catch that."

"We'll be joining you shortly, Lorian, be a dear and break out the neural stimulants. They're by the bat cages." He switched off the comm. and stepped into lift besides Lizzy who was staring at her mother in abject horror and terror. She clung to Phlox the moment he was close enough.

"Is mummy going to be alright?" She asked, her voice quivering under the strain of emotion. Phlox crouched down to her level.

"Go with Lt. Sato to the mess and play a game of chess. If you win, come see me, if you lose play until you win or I Comm. you, alright? Then you can see your mummy." Lizzy nodded, turning to Hoshi and taking her hand. The turbo lift was not designed to hold eight people so they were cramped until they reached deck eight and the majority of the occupants filed out to get to sickbay. Lizzy half made to go with them but Hoshi ordered it to deck Three and the mess hall.

"I can't play chess." Lizzy said, looking up at Hoshi with tearful eyes as if this was some great failing she needed to be absolved from.

"I'll teach you, don't worry Lizzy. Phlox is the best doctor in Starfleet. If anyone can make your mother better it's him." Lizzy sniffed, rubbing her nose with her sleeve.

"That's what daddy said when Mally got sick but he didn't get better. He's still in hospital." Lizzy said, dragging her feet as they left the turbolift.

"Malcolm was sick?" Lizzy nodded.

"He was kidnapped by the Romulans. Daddy said they treated him bad so he became poorly. He was treated bad a long time but when the war ended the prisoners were sent back and daddy said that Mally would get better but he's been in hospital a long time and he still walks funny. Daddy says it's because they hurt his knees and when people's knees are hurt they walk funny. Why is his hair a different colour to when he's at home?" Hoshi was so busy processing all the data that she completely missed Lizzy's question. There was a war between Starfleet and the Romulans! She had to tell someone! Malcolm was kidnapped and tortured, how long was he gone for?

"How long was Mally gone for, Lizzy?"

"Long before I was born. I don't know. Lots of years." The horror on Hoshi's face was not lost on Lizzy who realised her mistake.

"Don't worry! I'm sure he'll get better! I bet his hair will change colour too. I think he looks prettier with dark hair to white hair. Uncle Mally is the best! Ye're gonna have babies so I can play with them when I visit." Hoshi didn't know which she was more shocked with. The news that Malcolm, her husband in the future, was a prisoner of war for years during the Romulan war or that Malcolm, her _husband_ in the _future_ was going to make babies with her. She just never thought about Malcolm that way before. She hadn't thought about anyone on the ship that way before, except maybe Trip but that was different, they were locked in Decon together and dieing. You were bound to form and emotional attachment then…She never liked Malcolm, didn't like Malcolm…

"Aunty Mally? HOSHI!" Her head snapped round to look at Lizzy who was staring at her with a quizzical expression. "Where's the chess board?"

_**IOIOIO**_

"What happened?" Lorian asked, leaving Rialta's bedside and rushing to Trip's as he was laid down.

"He got a first hand example of the Vulcan neck pinch." Phlox said, running a scanner over T'pol's shivering body.

"And my mother?"

"She's deep in Plak Tow. I think…Hold on…" Phlox looked completely confused. "According to these scans she's perfectly fine." He shook his head and turned to Archer. Judging by the indignant squawk the medical scanner made he was still in rather bad shape. "Do you have those stimulants I asked for?" Lorian handed him a prepped hypo and he discharged it into Archer's temple hoping to still the life signs on the biobed which were fluctuating madly.

"It's the null, time is bouncing back and forth. It wont be much longer before time starts to ripple and disperse. Could you revive Commander Tucker please?" Phlox moved past him and reloaded the hypo with a stimulant before shoving it into Lorian's arms as he ran to attend to Archer who's life signs were plummeting at an alarming rate. Lorian discharged the hypo into Trip's neck where already a nasty bruise was forming over the nerve cluster. He jerked awake with a grunt and looked around.

"I need your help Commander, we are running out of time. We need to finish hooking up the power supply soon." Trip slipped off the bed and took a few uneasy steps, rubbing his shoulder.

"Yeah, sure. I forgot how much that hurts. What do you need?"

"Without Rialta's aid reconfiguring Enterprise's power couplings will take far longer than we have. Your expertise is required there far more urgently than it is required in the cargobay though I suggest you assign to highly competent Engineers to finish hooking up Rialta's ship to Enterprise." They marched out of sickbay leaving Phlox to work on Archer. Rialta groaned from where she lay and turned onto her side, her eyes flickering open.

"Where's Lorian?" She croaked but her question fell on deaf ears as the bio signs dropped to nil and Phlox rushed to save Archer's life. Rialta slid off the bed and slipped quietly out of sickbay after Trip and Lorian. Malcolm followed her, grasping her arm gently.

"Rialta, you should be in bed. Please, you've had a rough day."

"No time." She murmured. "Out of time. Lorian needs my help with recalibrating Enterprise. Can't do it on his own you see, not in the time frame."

"Rialta, according to him your heart stopped. Now, there's working yourself to death and then there's working yourself to death." She smiled up at him, her eyes slightly glazed.

"That's what I liked about you, Malcolm. You have a good sense of humour, shame you hide it. You were a good man but if we don't finish work on Enterprise soon, and by soon I mean now, then we're all dead and if you and Hoshi die I'll have never of existed anyway." Malcolm furrowed his brow, confused a moment.

"What are you talking about?"

"You'll see, very soon, you'll see." She pulled out of his grasp and tried to run down the hallway but ended up tripping herself up in her weakened sate and tumbling to the floor. Malcolm rushed to her aid and saw she was running a fever, her face flushed a sickly yellow. "Dad." She whined, reaching for him. "I'm too weak, the null is making the sickness progress too fast. You'll have to carry me to the Jeffries tube. Lorian can't finish it on his own. He'll blow Enty to pieces. Please daddy." Malcolm was stunned a moment, did she just call him daddy? This was impossible, she must be delusional.

"Rialta, we have to get you to sickbay. You're delusional."

"No…no…I'm not, Malcolm. You're my father and I need you to help me. Get me to Lorian. He needs my help you all do."

"I can't be your father!" She smiled.

"Damn you, just carry me!"

"No! Not until you explain yourself." Rialta closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

"I thought the name would have been a give away. Alright, alright…In a few months from now Enterprise will find a drifting escape pod. Inside will be a faint, unknown life sign who, it turns out, is yours truly. If it wasn't for you and Hoshi taking me in I'd have died. Enterprise was the only ship in the vicinity and your blossoming relationship was only further cemented by a child. I would have thought the name would have given it away. Rialta…it means Star in Gaelige. Your grandmother used to call you her rialta beag. Her little star…You thought the name appropriate for me. I always liked it. But you see, if ye don't find me I'll die and none of this will have happened and you'll all die anyway so there's working myself to death and then there's not working myself to death. I'm dieing anyway, Malcolm. I'm too far from home to reach help and even if I wasn't…there isn't enough time. You'd think for a time-traveller I'd have barrels, wouldn't ya but like your father always said, every second counts." Malcolm was too stunned to stop her and she slipped away. Him and Hoshi? A child? It was all too surreal but Rialta? She wasn't even human, she was adopted…Time travelling aliens was one thing but she was a part of _his_ future. That's why she looked and sounded familiar. The was she carried herself, spoke, acted, looked; it all screamed Reed. She was so much like his sister but…no, she was his Rialta.


	9. My ship, my life, my Vulcan!

Children of Enterprise 

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

**Tata**: Ehem...well...(Shifty eyes) You see I'm from...Greenland? Yes, Greenland and we spell it that way there (Shifty eyes) Okay, okay, I admit it. I can't spell to save my life and I'm not actually from Greenland. Dying is when you dye something and I don't think Lorian would be so upset if she was doing that...unless it was than blue shirt of his. Anyway, sorry this took so long to update. I've been run raggad recently and I didn't notice I hadn't updated in so long. I should be ashamed. I would ask you to beta but considering there's only going to be three, maybe four chapters more, there isn't much of a point.

**Edtheoldsarge**: (Salutes) Probably not an actual Sarge or in my countries army but neh, okay, you'd kinda have to be Irish or Scottish to know this but Gaelige is the Irish word for Irish and Gael is the Scottish word for Scottish. They are both essentially the same language but eveolved from Gaelic, the orignal tongue used hundreds of years ago that hasn't been spoken in, well, hundreds of years. I forget sometimes that not everyone knows these terms. English isn't my first language you see, Irish is and I'm just so used to speaking and writing it that it slips my mind.

**Firebirdgirl**: dammit! Forgot the cliffy, I'll just have to give and extra hangy one this chapter...Okay, hangy isn't an acutal word but bear with me here.

_**IOIOIO**_

"Alright, pull." Trip reached forward and grabbed the lever in the roof of the Jeffries tube.

"God damn it boy, you're the Vulcan with superior strength, why aren't you doing this?" Trip grunted as he began to pull, throwing his whole weight into the simple act of moving the lever which, in his defence, was attached to a ten stone mechanism.

"Because I'm the better engineer and I have to make sure nothing blows up while you're transferring power."

"Oh, that was low, Lorian. You learned that off your mother, I'm a southern gentleman." Lorian couldn't help but smile at his father as he grunted and managed to pull the lever half way.

"Don't let it snap back up." Lorian warned getting a dirty look from his father. Trip eased the lever back up and sighed.

"Alright, that was the last one, now they're all transferred over the only thing left to do is head down to Engineering and manage the transfer of each and every cell. I'd hate to blow us all up." Trip crawled over to the hatchway and smiled uncertainly when he peered down. "What you doin' here? I thought you were in sickbay."

"I was." Rialta's head emerged from the hatchway and Lorian openly scowled.

"You shouldn't be here, not in your condition."

"Jeese, Techie. I'm only feverish, not pregnant."

"Nah, the boy's got a point, if you're not well you better let Phlox fix you up." Trip said, angling his body so he didn't fall down the hatch or thrust his rear into Lorian's face. Rialta laughed as if she found something funny and popped out of the hatch, sitting on the walkway behind it. She looked up and noticed the lever had changed sides.

"You're done." She said, almost disappointedly.

"Yeah, we're just about to head down to engineering. Care to come with? We could use your expertise." Trip slid into the hatch, grabbing hold of the ladder between Rialta's knees and getting ready to descend.

"She's not going anywhere, she'd in no condition…"

"FOR THE LOVE OF GOD TECHIE! I AM NOT AN INVALID! YOU ARE NOT QUALIFIED OR CAPABLE OF MONITORING THE TRANSFER! YOU HAVE NO IDEA OF THE SENSITIVITY OF INTRICACY OF MY SHIPS SYSTEMS! YOU'D BE PLAYING IT BY EAR AND THAT COULD GET US ALL KILLED! I'VE DONE THIS BEFORE SO _I'LL _HANDLE IT!" She roared, her face yellowing with anger.

"But you are…" Lorian began and she cut him off again.

"Commander Tucker, leave! Your son and I have to have a few words…" Trip didn't need telling twice. Her quite voice was far more frightening than shouting and he slid down the ladder as quickly as possible. Lorian truly was his mothers son, no idea how to handle delicate situations like women.

Rialta stared at Lorian without saying anything. Her mouth in a thin line and her clear blue eyes crackling with rage.

"This is _my_ business. Not yours. Do you meddle in the affairs of a Vulcan going through Pon Farr? No, you leave them to themselves." Lorian had never been one for tip toeing around matters such as Pon Farr like other Vulcans but he could feel his own anger rising at using such a biological defect against him. His Vulcan control kicked in and he checked it quickly, instead replying calmly and levelly.

"If a Vulcan undergoing Pon Farr continues to work then there is intervention and he is brought to help. I'm only trying to help, Rialta."

"Help?" She laughed cruelly. "Techie, don't interfere. This is a deeply personal, Katarian thing. Let it go."

"You need help! We'll get this over with then I'll help you."

"MAYBE I DON'T WANT YOUR HELP!" She spat and Lorian flinched, his eyes widening. She had struck a blow closer to heart than he cared to admit.

"I…"

"Techie." She began, a little more calmly. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that."

"No, I think I understand exactly what you meant. I'm sorry to have inconvenienced you." She could almost see the Vulcan shields snapping down and remorse swelled up inside her like a balloon.

"Oh god, Techie, please, I didn't mean it like that." She reached out to touch his arm but he shrugged her off.

"Rialta. You're right. This is a private thing. I shouldn't have interfered." She grabbed him firmly by the shoulders and pulled him to face her.

"Techie, you don't understand what's wrong with me. Don't make presumptions about what you don't know."

"I know _exactly_ what's wrong with you Rialta. I read the medical file you pulled up." Rialta reared back as if struck.

"You did what?" She breathed, horror reflected in her wide azure eyes. "Oh my God…Techie"

"My name is Lorian." With that the Vulcan disappeared down the hatchway. Rialta sat, stunned, for several moments before following him down.

_**IOIOIO**_

Trip looked up when Lorian entered engineering. He could tell that whatever words had passed between the two hadn't gone down well. Lorian was moving like a stalking panther, his calm face not obscuring the almost palpable anger crackling beneath the surface.

"Isn't Rialta coming?" Trip asked, gently probing for any hint of what occurred between them.

"She should be along shortly." Lorian said curtly, rechecking the preparations Trip had just made. A snide remark in the Jeffries tube was one thing, double checking his work was another.

"Don't worry Lorian, they're okay." He said, coming up behind him. He could see the tension in his sons shoulders and wanted to reach a hand out to soothe him but this was another Trip's son, he hardly knew this man of his own flesh and blood.

"This is highly advanced technology, even I have difficulty understanding it. It pays to be careful." The engineering doors opened and Rialta walked in. her face was as blank as Lorian's and Trip could read nothing from her. From his experience when a women had her shields up she was ready for battle and no one and nothing was safe. What was that saying about hells wrath?

Rialta hung back from Lorian and Trip, biting her lip and staring at the back of Lorian's blue tunic. She seemed to be considering something a moment then brushed past him, giving him the literal cold shoulder out of the way.

"Move aside Lorian." She said well after she had brushed him out of the way. Lorian stood, his hands still poised as if he were still standing over the console, glaring at her. He said nothing but straightened, watching her every move with a critical eye. Was it Trip's imagination or did the temperature just drop?

"I'll monitor the flow from here, I'll inform you when it is complete. Commander Tucker, I'd like you to go down to my ship and monitor everything from there. Make sure nothing blows."

"Are you sure you wouldn't like Lorian to do it? He's more familiar with this advanced technology than I am." Trip asked, both Lorian and Rialta stiffened.

"It's hardly Warp Science, Commander. Just make sure nothing blows up. I have faith in your capabilities as an Engineer." Trip smiled at her and nodded, turning to Lorian and seizing him by the elbow. Dragging him with him.

"You heard what she said, she wants _you_ to monitor the flow from the other end. I am going to my quarters." Lorian said, trying to pull his arm away.

"Dammit Lorian! You have the finesse of a brick, you know that!" Trip said, his voice a few decimals short of being a shout. "You are the one that should be down there monitoring that. I'm damned if I'm gonna admit you're the better engineer here but you have more experience with this kind of technology than I do. Lorian, you're a fine Engineer but if you had half as much tact with women as you do with machines she wouldn't be half as pissed with you as she is. My first girlfriend, Anna, Rialta is exactly like her. Cold shoulder, passing you over, brushing you off. Petty slights that are unlike her because she wants you to realise that you've hurt her. For the love of god, go in there and kiss and make up."

"Kiss her?" Lorian asked, moving back slightly. "I think you are under a false impression of our relationship at the moment." Trip stopped and grinned.

"Therein lies the problem."

"Excuse me?" Lorian asked, losing his father's train of thought completely.

"Repeat what you just said, Lorian."

"Excuse me?"

"No," Trip slapped his own head. "You are being purposely dense now. What you said before that, about my impression."

"I said that I thought you were under a false impression of our relationship." At this Trip smiled.

"No, no you didn't. You said 'I think you are under the false impression of our relationship…_at the moment_.'" Lorian opened his mouth to protest or at least explain it away. "Please Lorian, give me some credit. It doesn't take a genius to see the way you act around her. You're a lot…I don't know, looser. You smile more, tell jokes, make physical contact. Just a brush of the arm, a hand on the shoulder, passing a data padd. Lorain, it's alright. I've actually gotta say it was kinda fun watching ye two. I know it's probably not your first crush but…"

"It's not a _crush_." Lorian said, stepping back, his eyes wide with indignity.

"Jeese, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that. I mean, she's stopped calling you by that cute little nickname she had for you. Techie was it?"

"She has made her feelings on the matter very clear."

"For the love of…Exactly like your mother. She has no finesse for these sort of things either but I don't suggest you just strip off in front of Rialta, I don't think that'll work for her." Lorian stood there silent for a moment.

"That was a little too much information." He said at last, not looking at Trip.

"Face it Lorian, your mother and I have had sex. Did you think you were brought by a stork? Now, this isn't about me and T'pol, it's about you and Rialta. Dammit Lorian, she wouldn't be this pissed about whatever was said unless she cared about you too, think about that. Now come on, lets head down to the shuttle bay." Trip strode on ahead of him leaving a slightly dazed Lorian behind him. He didn't have time for this, he had to keep his mind on the job. After they got the ship ready to jump there was still the matter of Scaron and…he didn't have the finesse of a brick. He could be quite smooth when he wanted, he just didn't want to be…

_**IOIOIO**_

When T'pol came to she found sickbay empty save for Captain Archer and an apparently sleeping Phlox. Throwing her legs over the side she made her way over to Doctor Phlox and shook him by the shoulder to wake him.

"Doctor?" She said softly, then realising the idiotism of whispering to a man she was trying to wake she said it louder. "Doctor!" Phlox jerked awake and spun to face her.  
"Commander! You're awake!"

"This surprises you?"

"Well considering the fact that you and the Captain are defying all medical logic at the moment, yes! One minute your dieing, the next you're as healthy as you've ever been the next you're dead! I just can't keep up with this! No matter what I do, nothing seems to help at all and your life signs just go mad anyway! The Captain was dead for nearly half an hour then his life signs just went back to normal. That just does. Not. Happen." Phlox sighed and bowed his head.

"Perhaps it is the temporal flux we are in." T'pol offered, Phlox looked up and smiled.

"Either that or you and the Captain have become imperious to death."

"As nice as that sounds, Doc, I don't think that's the case." Archer groaned as he propped himself up on the biobed. "What happened? Last thing I remember is being on the bridge looking at the Traduit Nebula. Oh, I have a serious brain pain though."

"Brain pain?" T'pol asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Calling it a head ache would be far too much of an understatement. What's going on?" Phlox and T'pol shot each other incredulous looks.

"You really don't remember?" Phlox asked, getting up and taking out his medical tricorder.

"No, what happened?" T'pol stepped forward and cleared her throat. This was going to be very awkward.

"You were kidnapped by a Katarian named Rialta for the sake of protecting you from a time travelling mad man named Scaron who wants to kill you to make his version of the perfect future. Lorian is also on board with Rialta and a young girl called Lizzie who is yours and my daughter from the future. Do you understand?" John just sat there for a few moments, blinking at her.

"Woah…that's a bit much to take in…So, time travellers again? I thought we'd seen the last of them…Well…our kids from the future and yours and Trip's kid from the future are on board battling time travelling mad man…Hmm…You sure she's ours?"

"She does resemble you greatly." T'pol said, somewhat annoyed that he was more concerned with the child's parentage than the state of emergency they were in. Archer nodded again, trying to take in this new information.

"Alright…you understand I'm a little bit sceptical."

"Captain, the least of our problems are their parentage. The ship is stuck in a temporal null."

"What?"

"A space where time does not exist. As we speak we are losing time and matter and if we do not leave soon, we are all going to cease to exist."

"Can't we just get out the way we got in?"

"We are trying, Rialta's ship was drained of energy because her ship was not properly prepped for the jump. We are transferring Enterprises Energy to her to get out of the null but that is the least of troubles."

"Let me guess." Archer said, raising a hand to stop her. "That mad man you were talking about is on the other side of the null with a lot of big, bad ships?" T'pol's eyebrow arched up in surprise.

"Yes, you are remembering."

"No, I'm just getting used to this whole 'The universe hates me' kinda life style and time travelling troubles are pretty uniform after a while. So, what are we going to do once we get out of the null and face this…Scar guy."

"Scaron…We have not discussed a strategy yet." Archer smiled up at her, sliding off the bed.

"I suppose that's my cue. So where's this Rialta who's saving the day?"

"I believe she would be in Engineering or the shuttle bay."

"Alright, engineering is closer." Archer smirked getting up. "You know, apart from the knife in my head, I feel pretty good." He gave his back a little stretch and sighed. "You comin' T'pol?" He asked, grinning over his shoulder at her. Phlox smiled at her and made a 'shoo' motion with his hands.

"An empty sickbay is a happy sickbay. Plus, if you die on the way you'll possibly resurrect yourself in a few minutes so there really is no need to stay here." He punctuated the last remark with a yawn. T'pol nodded and followed Archer out the door. He walked in a way she hadn't seen before, swinging his arms and kicking up his heels giving an unusual bounce to his step. When they arrived in Engineering they immediately saw Rialta hunched over the console making adjustments every few moments.

"Rialta." Archer called and she waved him away.

"In a minute." She snapped, her hands flying over the console. Archer stood waiting patiently, a curious smile on his face for several minutes till Rialta gave a satisfied nod and turned to Archer. "Oh! John. I didn't know you were up and about again. What can I do for you?" She motioned him to walk with her as they headed out of Engineering and towards the shuttle bay.

"I was just wondering what we're going to be doing about Scaron once we get out of the null." Archer said, staring at the three small horns down the centre of her forehead.

"Oh, that's simple. I'm gonna fly out, lay down fire and streak in one direction while Enterprise streaks in the other. Because I'm faster than Enterprise I'll be able to get away easier so he'll think you're on my ship. For cautions sake, knowing Scaron, he'll send half his fleet after Enterprise but that'll give you a better chance to get away. If you follow the flight plan Techie made out you should be able to lose them in the nebula and if you pass close to the corona of a star, they wouldn't dare follow you, and you'll be able to get away. There's no guarantee but all the matters is you surviving. Not Enterprise."

"Woah, hold on. Enterprise does matter! There arealmost ahundred people on this ship and…"

"John, you are the founder of the…"

"Federation! I know! This is the same crap every time travelling meddler has fed me. I'm the one who unites the galaxy, brings peace to a turbulent universe, so on, so forth."

"…Well I wouldn't say you brought peace to the universe. Universal peace was really secured by the Klingons which is kinda ironic if you think about it." Rialta said, cocking her head to one side and matching Archer's glare with a somewhat vacant look.

"I wont abandon my crew." He said stubbornly. Instead of her putting up a fight, as he expected, she smiled.

"Yeah, I know. I know you too well John and I have just as much to lose as you. Here's what I'm gonna do. Enterprise follows the flight path, I take you to a nearby planet, drop you, swing back, sneak up on the bad guys, attack which should slow them down and allow Enterprise to get away and then Enterprise will swing back, pick you up, high tail it back to Terran space, I go home and we all live happily ever after in our respective time lines. Sound good to you?" Archer frowned, shaking his head.

"What if Enterprise is destroyed, I'd like to stay with my ship."

"Staying with it will get you killed. Their sensors are very powerful, they'll cut through your shields and hull with no problem. They find you're not here, they might lay off."

"What shields?"

"…Oh yeah, you polarise the hole. My gods, your ship doesn't stand a chance if you stay. So come on." Archer and Rialta entered the shuttle bay, T'pol staying behind and moving to a Comm. Trip and Lorian were already in the shuttle bay, sitting in the pilot and co pilots chair. They seemed to be deep in discussion when everyone arrived but stopped as soon as Rialta and Archer stepped in.

"Out of my chair, Tucker." She snapped and both Lorian and Trip stood causing her to grin. "Aw, that was kinda cute. I meant you Commander." She stepped past Trip and sat down in the chair, her hands dancing over the alien console easily. Archer saw Trip elbow Lorian in the side and nod towards the co pilot chair. Lorian shook his head and mouthed something back but Trip just grabbed him by the shoulder and pushed him forward.

"What's all that about?" Archer asked T'pol as she stepped into the ship.

"I have no idea." She said as Trip walked the two steps to where they were standing.

"He's your son." He muttered to T'pol and leaned up against the bulkhead.

"Are we bringing Lizzy?" Lorian asked, watching Rialta work.

"It's too dangerous for her here…unless I drop her with Archer. There's too few certainties. This is why I never bring her on these expeditions. It's too dangerous for a child." Rialta said, frowning at the screen in front of her that displayed read outs in a foreign language.

"Too dangerous for anyone." Lorian said quietly and she turned to face him. Looking at him oddly a moment.

"I suppose…T'pol, Tucker, I'm about to send us back. You better get out of he Shuttle bay, I'll have to depressurise it immediately and fly off if I've any hope of the plan working. T'pol, you take control of Enterprise and I'll handle the situation here….better get Lizzy first."

Almost as if summoned Lizzy streaked through the doors to the cargobay, Hoshi running behind her looking run ragged. Lizzy leapt the last few feet and collided with Archer, fastening herself onto his midriff.

"Lizzy?" He asked, looking to T'pol for confirmation. She nodded once and Lizzy detached herself from Archer, flinging herself to her mother and latching onto one of her legs.

"You're not going without me, no way." She said into T'pol's thigh.

"My god, you have the hearing of a Ferengi!" Rialta said aghast.

"No, I just know how you think! I'm not too little to battle Romulans." Lorian smiled over at her and stretched out his hand. Lizzy detached herself from her mother and hopped into Lorian's lap, buckling herself in.

"You said it yourself, she'd be safer with us." Lorian said at the dirty look Rialta gave him for allowing her onto his lap.

"Alright, now, Trip, T'pol. Jump ship."

"I'm not going anywhere." Trip said crossing his arms.

"Damn straight, you're staying on Enterprise." Rialta snapped.

"No, I'm staying with ye." Trip smirked at her. "Just try and stop me."

"And you say he takes after his mother…" She snarled and turned her attention to T'pol.

"You know what to do."

"I am sure Lieutenant Reed will be able to handle it well enough."

"Oh my god! It's a family of freaking mules! No! My ship! My rules! Off! Off! Off! You too Lorian! All of you!" Lorian crossed his arms in imitation of his father and T'pol followed suit. "I hate you all! Fine, but Reed doesn't know anything! We just talked about it on the way down."

"Actually I briefed him while ye were arguing about seating arrangements in here."

"…Did I mention I hated you all?" She said, turning back to her console with a sulk. "Fine, but Hoshi is definitely not coming."

"Why not?" She asked, crossing her arms.

"Because…This ship is small enough as it is. It's a two seater and there are seven people in here!" Hoshi looked to Archer and he smiled apologetically to her.

"She's right, it is cramped. Go look after Lieutenant Reed." He said, Lizzy gigged getting a strange look from Archer, but said nothing.

"Yes Captain." She stepped outside of the ship and made her way to the bridge. So it was down to her and Reed now, time had an odd sense of humour.

"Finally, I'm getting my way." Rialta sighed, reaching across to flick a switch on the console and sat back, the ships door closing. "Alright, here we go."


	10. Love, Labour, Lost!

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

A/N: Ah, my favourite part, the authors note.

Angelus-2003: What can I say but...doh! Thanks for the heads up, I've changed it now. I watch way too much TOS anyway.

gammara: Pon Farr nookie! I love it! Seriously, your reviews make me laugh harder than any others I've ever gotten before. Pon farr smackdown instantly jumps to mind when I think of Vulcans which always puts a smile on my face. lol.

Tata: Ah! Stay away from me you crazy broom weilding lady! lol. I didn't have time to beta this one like I usually do so I aologise in advance for the spelling errors, now if you'll excuse me I'm off to my broom proof bunker.

Firebirdgirl: I'm so glad she hasn't spawned into a MarySue or something horrific like that. I'm always careful about Oc's and it's nice to know people like them...But don't get too attached...you'll see what I mean.

_**IOIOIO**_

Scaron arrived on the bridge early, like he had the last five days. The space before him lay empty and still with no trace of the ship that occupied it almost a week ago. With the way the temporal null went they could have been out in seconds or days…maybe not at all. The real danger of the null was time dissipation. The time that engulfed the ship would drain away, as if one were approaching the event horizon of a black hole, slowing and slowing till it stopped. He really hoped they didn't die in the null. He had waited to long, made too many calculations for it to end this way. The only way to effect _his_ timeline and not an alternate one was to slip into the timeline, cut the future loose and forge a new one. The dynamics were complicated and as foreign to him as Klingon culinary skills but he did know one thing. Archer had to die and he had to die now. The space in front of him rippled and went still. The temporal bubble had to have collapsed, if Enterprise hadn't remerged then that's all it could be.

"Report." He said, leaping to his feet and snapping his fingers.

"Sir, a rift opened and collapsed instantaneously. It doesn't make sense, it was like they tried to get out and failed." Scaron sat back down and opened his mouth to speak.

"SIR! I'm picking up two ships! One's Enterprise, one's Rialta's ship."

"Dammit! Archer?"

"I'm not picking up his life sign on Enterprise, I can't get a lock on Rialta's ship." Scaron paused a moment as both ships streaked away. Rialta's ship was off the sensors in seconds, it being capable of much higher warp, Enterprise crawled away at its high warp.

"Send a warbird and the six scouts after Enterprise, the other two warships and four attack cruisers come with us after Rialta's ship."

"It's only a scout, surely Enterprise is the bigger target." The Klingon said from his console.

"I am after Archer _not_ his ship. He's on Rialta's ship. It's better armed and shielded. We go after that. I'm sure our scouts can take care of that feeble 23rd Century toy. NOW! EXECUTE!" The stars streaked away and they followed Rialta's last known trail.

"Fan out, I want to cover as much space as possible. Rialta's clever but I wont let her get away, not this time." Scaron tried to relax back into his chair but with the end of the hunt this close he found it hard. It wouldn't be long now.

"Sir, Enterprise, Sir…"

"What is it?" He snapped at the Comm. officer. The Vulcan stiffened indignantly.

"I just got a report it pulled a Paris, Sir." Scaron raised one elegantly slanted brow in confusion.

"A Paris…" he said uncomprehendingly, then he remember the tales of an Admiral who took the reigns of his ship during a gun fight at the 'turbulent' times of the peace talks between what was known as the Federation and the Romulan Empire and lost an entire Romulan squadron by flying through the corona of a star, masking his signature and destroying the two ships that tried to follow them. "They flew through the corona of a star!" Scaron shouted! "Their ship can't do that!"

"Sir, we've lost them."

"Fan out! I want the whole area searched. They're only a warp five ship! Find them! FIND THEM!" With victory so close he would not lose, he could not lose.

_**IOIOIO**_

Malcolm breathed a sigh of relief as Travis informed him the danger was past, judging by the easing of the young pilots shoulders and the wipe of his sleeve across his brow he was just as worried as the Brit.

"Malcolm! Never, ever, do that again." Hoshi said, dislodging her fingers from where they had dug into the console, the colour slowly returning now she had released her vice like grip. "I'm getting damaged reports from all over the ship, blown conduits, failing systems….hull integrity is at twenty percent. This ship can't take temperatures like that, what were you thinking!"

"Fortune favours the bold, Ensign." Malcolm said, offering a brave smile but judging by his pale complexion he had been just as worried.

"Bold! That was just plain naughty, Malcolm." Hoshi scolded, a smile taking the edge off her words.

"But it worked, I'm not picking up any pursuit." The secondary tactical officer said, her face just as blanched as the rest.

"This wont shake them for long. I want the damage control crews working around the clock to get this ship back to shape and tactical teams in all strategic locations in case we're boarded. They might come looking for Archer if they find us." He paused a moment, biting his lip. "Fortune's favoured us so far, lets see just how far we can push the bar. Take us into the heart of the Traduit, Travis." Travis swung around in his chair.

"Sir! We'll be flying blind! None of our sensors will work and there's no telling if their advanced technology can break through the interference! Plus, the plasma currents that deep in are unpredictable, we could be torn apart."

"I trust you Travis and it's our only hope. We're facing a foe better than us in every way, all we've got going for us is good old human ingenuity, something the enemy doesn't have. Take us in Ensign." Reed sat back in the chair in an attempt to ground himself. It didn't work and he could feel himself tensing up even more. He chanced a look over to Hoshi who was watching him with keen dark eyes almost as if weighing him up. That did nothing to relieve his tension knowing she was watching him. She seemed to come to some conclusion and looked down at her console, blushing at being caught. Although Malcolm had no idea what she was thinking about he was glad she was finished scrutinising him. He had to concentrate on what was going on now, even though he was helpless to do anything as Enterprise was caught in the eddies and currents of the nebula. Archer was counting on him and he didn't want to let him down, or the ever watchful Hoshi.

_**IOIOIO**_

Archer and Trip clung to the bulkheads for support as the ship was rocked horribly exiting the rift. Enterprise was left behind in a psychedelic stream of light and the ride became a little smoother.

"S'all right. You can let go of my arm." Trip said, looking down at the white knuckled grip T'pol had on his arm. She straightened up now the inertial dampeners had taken hold again and cave a look at the finger marks rumpled into his sleeve, she must have been holding on hard.

"I apologise." She said, feeling embarrassed at her emotional display.

"Don't worry 'bout it." Trip smiled then turned to Rialta. "Where to now little lady."

"I'm the same height as you." She said, her hands dancing over the controls. "Give or take an inch but now we are flying into that sun." She indicated the yellow dot up on a holographic screen in front of them that had lines and symbols that were unintelligible to everyone but her in the ship.

"That doesn't sound to safe." Archer said, putting a hand on the back of Lorian's chair and leaning forward, peering sagely at the screen. "What's all this?" He indicated to all the green lines crisscrossing over the screen.

"Unless you want that headache to get any worse then don't ask." She said, staring at the tiny purple glyphs that were now flashing in the bottom, left hand sign of the screen. "That's odd." Rialta muttered to herself as she worked, the rest of them remained silent, watching the screen and hoping to make some sense, any sense of what was going on around them. T'pol looked over at Trip to find him already look at her, smiling.

"What?" She asked, conscious of the close proximity of everyone else. She was half pressed up against the back of the ship with Archer's leg pressing into one of hers uncomfortably and Trip's elbow against her side.

"You're looking a lot better, that's all. You've been looking kinda poorly lately." T'pol had to admit, she was feeling a lot better apart from a gnawing pain in the back of her mind. She didn't say anything but turned away to watch the screen. The yellow dot was coming closer to the blue glyph she realised was the ship. A visual image came up on the screen of a turbulent young star that sent out flares every few seconds.

"Oh go away." Rialta snapped and the image disappeared.

"Now _that_ didn't look safe." Trip said, looking to Rialta.

"Don't worry." She said waving a dismissive hand. "Ten seconds." Lizzie's hand shot up and caught her father's pinky and ring finger in her own small hand. Archer looked down, strangely touched by a gesture common between any father and daughter. But he wasn't her father and she wasn't his daughter, at least not yet. "Five." Rialta said, her hands on two large, T shaped keys on the board with her eyes were closed, mouth set in a grim line and brows furrowed accentuating the three small horns down her forehead. Archer noticed a strange yellow webbing at her temples he hadn't seen before and she seemed to be sweating a light blue liquid. What a strange species she was. The pressure increased on his fingers and he saw Lorian wrap a comforting arm around the young girl's waist as she clung onto Lorian's arm with her other hand. "Past it." Rialta said, relaxing back into the chair, breathing deeply. "We passed through the corona of a new born star, ladies and gentleman, thank you for flying Rialta Airways. You have just made history as there wont be a passing like this for another five hundred years because your ship would melt at those temperatures." There was a round of nervous chuckles as the yellow dot was left behind them and a red x appeared on the far side of the screen. "We're nearly at the planet."

"What do we do once we get there?" Archer asked, noticing the yellow webbing spreading down the side of her face.

"There's a deck of cards in the glove box if you want to play a round of whist or poker, otherwise it's up to you." She said sourly, her concentration solely on the displays in front of her which flashed in a rainbow of colours.

"So we're just supposed to…loiter?"

"That's the idea." She said, closing her eyes a moment as if in pain. Archer was about to ask if she was alright when an alarm went off. "You gotta be kidding me! His ship can't move that fast!"

"What is it?" Trip asked, craning to see over Archer's shoulder.

"A scout…it's not following us. It seems to be…Enterprise!"

"What?" Archer tried to figure out what was going on, on the display screen but they made no more sense than before.

"Enterprise shook them. They did the corona trick we did but with a far more stable star at much more acceptable levels. Well I'll be damned, you must have one hell of a pilot." Archer grinned, realising that Rialta's news was good news.

"Travis is the best. What's going on?"

"Enterprise managed to shake whatever Scaron sent after them. I'm picking up ships on long range sensors in the area of space my computer predicts Enterprise will be in. The Traduit nebula is a very active nebula, it's got a lot of interference going for it. As long as they hang there, they'll be fine. I'll drop ye off then catch the attention of that scout. Get them to follow me then duck into the star nursery a few lightyears off."

"INTO!" Trip and Archer said at the same time, equally shocked and horrified. "You'll be destroyed." Trip said, casting a glance at Lorian who was looking curiously detached from the entire conversation.

"No, I wont. I'll be careful not to fly into any stars, just scoot around the gases, try not to get into anything I can't handle. Trust me, I'm an experienced pilot. Wouldn't be the first time I did something insane like this."

"Now that I can believe." Trip said, rolling his eyes. What had his son gotten himself into? Rialta gasped, one hand going to her temple, the yellow webbing was far more prominent now underneath her skin and it stretched to her jaw. This was definitely a new occurrence. "What's wrong? Rialta, your face!" Lorian shifted Elizabeth out of his way to see Rialta. Before he could say anything Rialta swore loudly and the ship rocked with a blast.

"Dammit! He followed us through, I didn't see him!" Rialta growled, her hands sliding across the control panel and the display turning grey and red. The battle played out before them on the unintelligible screen of Rialta's and it wasn't until she relaxed that they did. The only change on the display was the disappearance of a red dot but they presumed the other ship had been destroyed or lost. "Gottim, not before he did damage though. Manage to punch a hole through my shields. Transporters are fried, I'll have to drop you down on the planet Flash Gordon style."

"Flash Gordon?" T'pol asked, now hanging onto both Archer and Trip for support as the ship shuddered, entering the upper atmosphere.

"Means I gotta land." Rialta's breathing was beginning to become laboured and her voice was husky. The ship landed smoothly on a large grassy prairie with all they could see from horizon to horizon was knee high turquoise grass, dotted with indigo flowers, apart from, of course, the ugly scar of a canyon across the otherwise featureless landscape. The small door opened sending in a whoosh of deliciously cool, fresh air that smelt faintly of cloves. Lizzie unbuckled herself and was off like a flash, running through the grass that almost covered her. T'pol was the next out, scanning the area for any threats to her daughter before following her at a far more leisurely pace. Archer looked to Rialta.

"Are you alright? You look unwell."

"Get out." Was the gruff reply.

"What about Enterprise."

"We've been over this, get out. The sooner you leave the sooner I can go after them." Archer straightened, looking to Trip and Lorian. Both father and son looked uncharacteristically blank as they stared straight ahead of them. Archer couldn't remember anything about Rialta but Trip seemed to have a good grasp of the situation so he left him to it, ducking out of the ship and following T'pol.

"Please leave us." Lorian said quietly to Trip, the first thing he had said since this misadventure had began.

"You're leaving as well." Rialta snarled, her head swinging around to face him. Trip looked between the two, not sure if he wanted to leave it to his, ever so slightly, obtuse son. Deciding he was old enough to stand on his own two feet Trip ducked out and jogged up to where T'pol was standing, watching as Lizzie ran around seemingly aimlessly in front of them.

"Get out Lorian." Rialta snarled, her eyes, bright with fever, turned angrily on him.

"Look at yourself Rialta, we must have been in that rift for days and the disease is catching up with you. You're too far gone."

"All the more reason why I must go. This is a suicide mission and you know it."

"I'm coming with you, I can help. I am, at least, lucid." Rialta hung her head, shaking it slightly, her aqua tears splashing on the console.

"No Lorian, I'm not going to let you do this to yourself. I don't want to kill you too."

"And I don't want to lose you." Lorian lent across to Rialta, raising her chin with one finger to look into his chocolate brown eyes. "We've been through a lot together and yet here we are. I'm not going to let you go now."

"You don't understand." She said softly. "I can't survive. I have no one."

"You have me." Lorian said, taking her face in his hands, a surprisingly intimate gesture for a Vulcan.

"I don't want your pity." She cried, pulling out of his grip, tears flowing freely now. "I don't want this to be about logic, Lorian. Can't you see that?"

"It's not, Rialta. I don't know how to make my intentions more obvious!" He grabbed her roughly by the shoulders, because she still had the harness on it he couldn't pull her to him but it helped to angle her for the kiss that took her by surprise. She wasn't prepared and he was, to his own embarrassment, far out of practice making it probably one of the most inelegant and awkward kisses in history but it was enough. Rialta began to cry, wrapping her arms around him and pulling him close.

"I don't want to lose you." Lorian said softly, burying his head in her hair. "Let me come with you."

"This is a suicide mission, Techie." She sobbed. "I'm not going to come back from this. I don't know if I can even save Enterprise. This has all gone so horribly wrong! It was never meant to be like this." He stroked her neck soothingly, hoping to calm her down. He could feel her emotions humming so close to the surface, all he'd have to do was reach out but doing so would pull her into the madness she must be suffering and one of them had to stay lucid.

"We can still get through this. Let's go get Enterprise then…" He wiped away one of her tears with his thumb, his palm caressing her cheek. Her hand moved up to lay over his, eyes closed and tears still falling. "Then we'll see how this goes."

"It was never meant to be like this." She said softly. "It was supposed to be so much more simple. I've messed it all up." Lorian kissed the bumps on her forehead and sat back into his chair, not bothering to buckle himself in. There was no need anyway, they weren't time travelling.

"Archer's safe, Enterprise is safe, Lizzie is safe. I'd say so far so good."

"But Scaron is so close and Enterprise isn't safe. I was supposed to grab Archer and get out of there. I thought he'd leave Enterprise alone if Archer wasn't there and I'd hide Archer until Scaron was forced to return to his timeline. It's too hard to come back to these periods, what with the temporal cold war so active in this timeline and that technology banned in theirs. There's only so long they can sustain themselves before they start to become of this timeline, making it impossible for them to return. You shed cells and eat food making yourself more and more of this timeline. That's why we were forced into this, we're so close to this timeline we can survive longer but they can't. It was supposed to just be a waiting game but now…" She wiped her eyes with her sleeve. "It's all your fault. You called me back to Enterprise, I was going to hang with Archer here, making him think we crash landed or something." She began to work at the console, closing the door behind her. Lorian couldn't help but smile as she started off on a rant about how all this was his fault. For a while at least she was back to herself but he could tell she didn't have long before the illness progressed too far. She could be dead in hours and judging by the fact she didn't pull away or smack him when they kissed, there was the potential for a future a hell of a lot longer than a few hours.

Archer watched the ship take off, it looked even smaller on the outside than it did inside. Lizzie crashed into his legs, gibbering in Vulcan and trying to pull him along. It was his guess she was glad to be outdoors again and wanted him to play with her. It was still hard for him to accept this was his daughter but the resemblance was uncanny. At least his brain pain had dulled to something barely more than a humming in the back of his mind, to soft to be called a headache but still annoying. He rubbed the back of his head and looked over to see T'pol doing the same. Odd. Trip came up behind her and said something that caused her to turn. The two began to walk away together and Archer let himself be pulled away by Lizzie. For all the tension and panic before playing in a field with his daughter seemed a little…anti climatic but this couldn't last…of that much he was sure.


	11. Hit the dirt before it hits you!

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

A/N: This chapter is very dodgy. Might 'beta's Aka two friends of mine who read this a minute ago had...conflicting thoughts. One hated it so much she tried to talk me out of posting it, the other thought it was fantastic and very thought provoking. Wasn't sure if that was what I was going for but neh. I don't know if this is really impartial anymore but flip it. Also, there is a swear word which I'm not taking out on principle! It's a very Brirish / Irish word.

**Tata**: Hurray! (Dances) I'm so proud. It's all been about getting your stamp of typo approval!Hope this one is as good but I didn't have time to beta properly so...neh!Only two more chapters to go, hurray!

**Gammara:**Okay, I know you're probably American and they're 6 hours ahead of us so a week has passed but it doens't count cause I'm Irish! And even though it's know half past twelve I started this thing a quarter to. Damn Kev talking to me on msn and being all distracting. Hmm...anywho...this is an extra long chapter just to make up for the half an hour. This chapter Iwas a bit iffy about posting cause it's kinda contriversial ...Oh, typoright there but I coudn't be bothered looking up the spelling, so trouble is a mild term to say the least. Big confrontation. Glad you liked the kiss, I got an aww in my local interent café for it, plus, I don't see Lorian as an eloquent (another typo) kind of guy in the first place. Also, what does rubber meets the road mean? That's an expression I've never heard before (Now there's a goad for a review if ever I heard one)

_**IOIOIO**_

The ship rocked slightly as Travis navigated the dangerous currents that were threatening to tear Enterprise apart. It had been almost an hour and they were still here, that was a good sign, but Malcolm knew it was hard going on Travis and that if they didn't get a signal from Rialta or any indication it was safe…they might have to pull out anyway, into the unknown dangers that awaited them. He snuck a glance to the readout that told him hull integrity and grimaced. The polarisation had helped at first but that had long since fallen to the eddies and now they were down to forty percent hull integrity. Surely Scaron couldn't still be looking. Surely Rialta had drawn him away by now…Surely... Damn. Too many uncertainties and no Captain to make the decision. Malcolm was a good tactician, he was a good officer and a damn fine Security Chief if he may say so himself but the uncertainties of command were just too much. How did he know whether or not his decision was the right one, how did he know whether or not his decision would get everyone on board killed? He had taken command before and they had gotten out fine, Archer had seen them through this far…but when had any of them faced anything like this? Sure, they played the ol' time travelling mad men game before but that was in the past where _they_ had the advantage. Nazi vs. Starfleet, that was a bit of a no brainer. Crazy, futuristic, Romulans vs. Starfleet 23rd Century…Things got a little bit more complicated. They were relying on a woman who they didn't even know, they couldn't even trust, who was probably what got them into this mess in the first place. It was her ship that dragged them into the null, her who took Archer, her orders that had Enterprise disabled and _her_ that had left them out here to fend for themselves. He glanced at the readout again. Thirty Eight flashed up in bright yellow letters and he knew it was now or never.

"Travis." He said, looking up at the dark skinned pilot. "Take us out. What ever way is easiest for you. Try and keep the ship in one piece and get ready to jump to warp." There was defeat in his voice, he knew it, but he really didn't see any other choice. They could get inevitably torn apart here or they could chance their arm out there. He wasn't a gambling man by nature but every now and again Lady Luck forced your hand and with all his cards on the table he just had to wait and see what the other players of this dangerous game threw down.

_**IOIOIO**_

Lorian and Rialta first encountered a scout, hanging behind some asteroids outside the Traduit, presumable waiting for Enterprise to make her move. Rialta knew Enterprise couldn't last forever in a nebula like that, they'd be lucky if she lasted over an hour, but they had to take this one ship at a time. Whittle down Scaron's numbers and lead the rest away. Her ship was tough and fast, their best chance to save both Archer and Enterprise but there were Warships out there and all she had was a scout.

"I have a lock." Lorian said, his eyes intent on the barely intelligible display. Rialta was going to fly the ship and he'd fire, that's the plan they had worked out, well, screamed at each other, on the fifteen minute trip back to the space Scaron occupied. "Firing." Three silvery stars streaked away from the underside of her ship, Scaron's scout moved instantly, slipping between the rocks. The first torpedo hit an asteroid and blew it to dust while the other two wove their way around the meteorites. The scout didn't stand a chance, being only 25th Century, and the second and third torpedo vaporised it. Lorian could see by the grimace on Rialta's face she hadn't enjoyed it. She never served on a Starship before, she had never had to kill.

"Picking up two more scouts making a perimeter of the nebula." Lorian said, watching Rialta adjust course to match. He saw Rialta sway in her chair and his heart leapt. Arguing would be pointless but it wasn't helping for him to see her like this. They had to end this quickly and get her the medical aid she needed.

"I'll streak in between them then loop back. This is open space, they get one torpedo each." She said, noticing the simple 26th century designs of Klingon Scout ships. Hardy but not very manoeuvrable.

"Aye, aye, Captain." Lorian joked, looking over to see her smile faintly. It pained him to see her like this. Soon, he promised himself, he'd make her better soon.

Their ship slipped out from behind the asteroid and flew between the two scouts. Instantly they reacted, turning to face the ship as it looped up and flew, upside down, over the other ships. Two torpedoes streaked away and destroyed both scouts on impact. The ship shuddered and Lorian heard Rialta swear in a rather unladylike fashion as a warbird came into view, 28th century and twice as powerful as they were. If Rialta had been at full health then he'd have no doubt she'd have some sarcastic or witty comment at the ready to ease the tension or make light of the situation but as it were, she was having difficulty breathing. The ship wove in and out of the nebula's gasses, through the small asteroid belt and some fancy flying later they managed to dodge most of the warbird's fire.

"FIRE BACK!" Rialta shouted, working hard to stray one step ahead of the warship.

"I AM!" Lorian shouted, "I'M JUST MISSING!"

"HOW CAN YOU MISS! THEY'RE GUIDED TORPEDOES!"

"WELL I'M MISSING!" He waited till he got a lock and fired, this time the torpedo did hit but the ship's shield held.

"Uhoh." He heard Rialta breath beside him. "Figured out while the missiles are missing." The display jumped up and a cold sickness roiled in Lorian's stomach. The torpedoes had missed because there was a bigger target in front of them. Scaron's warbird loomed in front of them. 29th Century technology and a hell of a lot of fire power aimed directly at them.

"Oh dear." Rialta breathed. "Hold on to your ears, Lorian." The ship rocked violently as it was peppered with phaser and torpedo fire. She pulled the ship beck behind the meteorites but they were soon vaporised by the fearsome warbird on their tail.

"We'll have to go into the nebula." Lorian said, firing at the two ships on their tail.

"Are you crazy? They'll be able to track us in there and the currents will make out flight path too predictable."

"I thought this was 29th century technology." Lorian teased, smirking over at her. Knowing she'd never drop a challenge like that.

"It is! Doesn't mean I can defy the laws of Physics with it!"

"You Time Travel, don't you?"

"Shut up!" She snapped. "Fine, your death sentence." The ship dipped into the swirling turquoise hues of the nebula, the two larger ships behind them.

"Shields are failing." Lorian said, "And you're almost out of torpedoes."

"Use the phasers more then!" She barked, concentrating on getting them through this in one piece. Both Lorian and Rialta gasped as Enterprise loomed out of the swirling mists in front of them. Torpedoes, for all the good they'd do, streaking away in a blizzard of amber light.

"TURN ABOUT!" Lorian shouted. "TURN ABOUT!"

"I AM! FIRE DAMMIT! FIRE! I'M NOT GOING TO LET THEM KAMIKAZE RUN!" She shouted back, slipping the ship around in a manoeuvre that would have brought a tear of pride to any seals eye. She peppered the warbird that was firing on Enterprise with torpedoes, these ones hitting because of the block Enterprise was between Scaron's bigger, meaner ship. The shields collapsed and Enterprises Torpedoes finally began to take effect against the ablative armour the other ship had. Rialta broke away from that one, and Lorian let loose the last contingent of torpedoes she had, powering up the phasers which would be useless against the larger ships in the long run but every hit counted. A yellow blip on their screen signalled the destruction of a ship and at Rialta's smile Lorian let out a sigh of relief. It wasn't Enterprise. That ship streaked over above them, letting loose its own contingent of torpedoes against the large ship.

"MALCOLM! FECK OFF!" Rialta shouted. "THIS ISN'T YOUR BATTLE! THIS IS SUICIDE!" At first Lorian thought Rialta was speaking from adrenaline but when Malcolm's voice came over the Comm. Lorian realised she had opened up communications.

"We're not leaving you to face that thing alone."

"Malcolm! Remember our talk while I was delirious outside sickbay?" There was silence from the other end. "NOW GO! If not for me, for mom!" He said nothing but Enterprise broke away. "I'm sorry Lorian." Rialta said, smiling weakly at him and reaching out to grasp his hand. "I had to."

"I understand, I did the same for my parents." Rialta pulled away and plotted a course into the nebula, Scaron broke pursuit once he ascertained Archer was not on board. With their shields down Scaron's sensors easily swept the ship and his hatred for Rialta didn't mean he'd forsake his mission. They were safe for now.

"I'm sorry Lorian." She breathed, her hands braced against the console. "I can't fight it anymore…I…" She slumped against the console and Lorian leapt up, movinh her into a sitting position and pulling up an eyelid. Her eyes flickered madly as if in REM and her skin was scalding and clammy to the touch.

"And I'm sorry too, I can't let you die." Lorian cast a glance to the display then back to Rialta. The ship wouldn't let them get into danger and Archer would be fine for another few hours…they had time… He placed his hands on either side of her face and chanted words he swore he'd never speak again.

"My mind to your mind, my thoughts to your thoughts."

_**IOIOIO**_

T'pol and Trip walked side by side across the waist high green grass running along side a ravine. Beautiful flowers crested each side of the gorge and Lizzie played happily amidst them under the watchful eye of her father.

"The resemblance is uncanny." Trip said quietly. "She's a lovely kid, you must be proud." T'pol remained silent for a moment and Trip thought she wasn't gong to answer when she spoke.

"She's not mine. I have no children." T'pol said, watching Lizzie chase a creature not unlike a butterfly but with glassy wings. "She is a different T'pol's. Like…a sisters."

"Cute niece then." He joked, smiling over at T'pol. "John seems to get on well with her."

"Indeed." Was T'pol's only reply as she turned away, walking along the lip of the ravine and looking down into it. It was sandy down below, so different from the verdant grazing lands up above and she could see small animals going about their business in the deep creased walls. "We could be here a while." She said, almost idly as she watched a Lemur like being emerge, blinking tiredly, from a crevice in the ravine wall.

"Yeah, we should really have brought ration packs or…something." Trip laughed, watching the Lemur, which he named Bev for the sake of it, scuttle down the wall and across the ravine floor. "I'm sure Rialta'll be back and we can take her and Lorian out for dinner. Never know, they might finally get talking. A little wine'll loosen anyone's tongue."

"What are you talking about?" T'pol asked, arching an eyebrow, totally clueless.

"Lorian has the hots for Rialta but wont tell her. Now if ya ask me I think she likes him too but then again, as his dad, my opinion is a little bias." He said, grinning as Bev climbed up a rock and began to look around as if missing something.

"The hots?"

"He wants to mate with her, T'pol." Trip said bluntly, glancing over as Lizzie began to scream with delight. Archer had picked her up beneath the arms and was swinging her around him much to the little girls delight.

"I…see. Why is this any of our concern?"

"He's our boy, that's why. Gotta make sure our boy's mating with the right girls now."

"He's not our boy. He is a different Trip and T'pol's."

"Any DNA test'll tell you he's a Tucker and a T'pol. He's our son. We may not have raised him but he's ours. Same way Lizzie's yours and…Johns." Something about the way he said the last part must have sent off warning bells in T'pol's mind and she stopped walking, turning to face him.

"You disapprove?"

"What? Of what?"

"Lizzie. Of Captain Archer and myself? Of the life our future counterparts led." Trip paused, looking distinctly uncomfortable.

"Nah, T'pol, I don't disapprove. If it makes you and John happy I can't fault it but there's no denying the fact I've feelings for you. I'd rather it was you and me. Can't make it any plainer than that. Maybe circumstances arose in that timeline that brought you together and drove us apart but right now, in this timeline, in this place I think that you and I have a lot more going for us. I mean…Hell…I don't know what I mean. I care about you T'pol, I'd even go so far as to say I love you and you can't deny you have feelings for me too. Don't try and deny it on the basis of your ears."

"If by basing it on my ears you are referring to my Vulcan heritage then no, I wont use that against you. Vulcans do have feelings, we just suppress and control them. In fact, Vulcan emotions are far stronger than human emotions." She turned away, looking out over the gorge. The lemur was gone off the rock and she couldn't locate it anywhere. Probably gone back to its hole.

"And?" Trip prompted, coming up behind her.

"I don't know what I feel. I'm not used to dealing with emotions." T'pol said tersely and Trip could tell he was treading dangerous grounds. "I do care about you. You are a good friend, a good Engineer and in your absence I miss you…"

"But…" Trip asked softly, standing so close he could feel the heat off her body.

"I feel the same about Archer. Perhaps because we have not copulated I do not express it in the same way. It is more of a friendship but apart from the sex I feel the same way about both of you…" Trip stared at her horrified.

"So what your saying is…If you were sleeping with Captain Archer then there'd be no difference."

"Yes." She said quietly, not expecting the rage Trip focused on her at that small concession.

"Damn T'pol! That's cold, even fer you!" He said, close to a shout with his Southern burr strengthening with anger.

"You asked for the truth, Commander, I gave it to you."

"Well then…thank you very much Commander T'pol but I seem to remember it was you who jumped _ME_!" He growled, poking himself in the chest. "You didn't strip off in front of Archer."

"Doing so would be inappropriate, he is my commanding officer." She said, putting as much ice into those words as she could. Trip's words had struck a blow she was all too eager to return.

"So what, it was a question of rank? If Malcolm hadn't been your subordinate then you'd have jumped him, huh?"

"Considering English males reputations perhaps he would have been a better subject." Trip looked murderous, almost ready to strike.

"Damn you," He hissed. "Have you no shame?"

"You started this!" She hissed back. "It was your emotions that influenced me. I thought you cared about me and when you turned your affections towards Amanda Cole I had to get them back."

"So this is about insecurities? Damn you T'pol. I love you! Don't you feel anything!" T'pol looked away, what could she say. It was true, she did have feelings for him and there was no denying it but after what was said she couldn't face them…even now.

"Charles." She said, using his given name as she knew the impact it would have. "I do care about you. I will not lie. If anything were to happen to you I'd grieve, perhaps more so than I would the others. That's not to say I don't care about Captain Archer also. I do not understand this rivalry between you two over me. He has no romantic intentions towards me, he stated so before."

"What? I can see how you'd drop that into conversation. 'Hey T'pol, I don't fancy you'."

"Don't be so obtuse. I have no wish to discuss this matter further."

"Fine!" Trip snapped, turning away. "Dammit, all you ever seem to do is hide your emotions. Push people away. But I guess that's all Vulcans are good for." Trip stalked off leaving T'pol standing alone.

"You alright?" Archer was at her elbow a few moments later. His keen blue eyes regarding her with an understanding she hadn't seen before.

"Commander Tucker and I have had a disagreement, that is all." She said, turning away to watch Lizzie who was sitting in the grass, plucking the petals of a giant red flower.

"Want me to talk with him?" Archer asked, his hand sliding up her arm, sending shivers down her spine.

"I do not think that is wise. It is you we were fighting over." Archer smiled though his eyes held no trace of amusement.

"Should I be flattered?" T'pol looked away, her face showing her distress but something told Archer she didn't want his comfort now and to back off.

"Watch Lizzie. She's been asking after you." He said, running a comforting hand over her back. "She looks tired, I think she should take a nap. I can't convince her, maybe you can. After all, that's what mothers are for." Archer was hoping for a sarcastic comment like 'dictating your sleeping time?' to show T'pol was alright but she just walked towards Lizzie in silence leaving him standing with his hand in mid air. He turned and jogged after Trip who was stalking away like a panther with a thorn in its paw. A dangerous combination. "Trip, what the hell went on between you and T'pol?"

"Nothing." Trip snapped, hardly looking over at him as they set up a gently sloping hill.

"It was obviously something, T'pol's upset, you're upset and I'm clueless."

"Do you have feelings for T'pol." Trip asked suddenly, stopping mid stride and turning to face Archer. That wasn't what he was expecting and he was left gaping for a few moments.

"What?"

"Do you have feelings for T'pol, John? Yes or no."

"She's a Vulcan, Trip." He laughed, pointing out the obvious.

"So? Do you have feelings for her?"

"She's a good friend, a good science officer…"  
"That's not what I meant. Do you have feelings for her?" Trip asked again, this time more forceful and Archer couldn't' bring himself to lie.

"Yes."

"Then why'd you tell her you didn't?" Trip asked, anger tingeing his voice.

"What? I never told her I…Tension…Sexual tension. We talked about that and we agreed nothing would happen but that was years ago."

"Vulcans have good memories." Was all Trip said before he set off again. Archer had to run to keep up with him.

"Nothing is going on between the two of us." Archer said hurriedly when he caught up. "I swear."

"Do you want there to be something? Do you want her?"

"She's my subordinate, Trip. I'd no more start something with T'pol than I would Hoshi." Archer said, dismissing the idea immediately.

"She wont always be. You'll get admiralty someday or she'll transfer off or get a promotion. What about then?"

"T'pol doesn't care about me any more than a friend, she cares about you, Trip."

"No. We're just friends who have sex." Trip said sourly.

"Come on Trip." Archer said, grabbing his friend by the shoulder. "T'pol didn't mean it like that and you know it. She's not too eloquent with words, you know that, and she's a Vulcan. She can no more communicate her emotions than a baby can and I don't think T'pol is the kind to go screaming and soiling herself, do you?" Archer was hoping the surreal imagery would break through to Trip's sense of humour but the Engineer stood there dourly. "Trip. T'pol cares about you a hell of a lot more than me or Malcolm." For some reason Trip winced but Archer pushed on. "Don't forget that. When you moved to Columbia she was in a foul mood. Plus there's that bond you two share. That brings the two of you closer than any two humans can ever get. She does care about you, maybe even loves you, she's been known to surprise." Trip looked up and shook his head.

"I don't know, I just don't know. I love her John, really, I do but I don't know if she feels the same."

"Can anyone ever tell what a Vulcan feels?" Archer asked, smiling encouragingly. "I don't even think she can. Between the Trillium, Pan'nar and Kir'shar all her emotional beliefs have been turned on their head and to top it all she was stuck with the emotional crew of Enterprise. That'd be hard for anyone. Maybe she went to you because she was confused and needed someone but remember Trip, she chose you because she feels more for you then anyone else on the crew."

"No, she chose me cause we were the same rank." Trip snorted, his anger ebbing.

"Don't be stupid, Trip. If that was the case she would have turned to another Vulcan as soon as we were on Vulcan. She turned to you because of that special bond you share." Trip seemed to grimace at those words. "I've never seen two people more mismatched who just seem to be able to make it work. I wont deny I care for T'pol but I don't love her Trip, not like you do." Trip stood silently before his Captain and friend for a long time, staring out over the view the small crest afforded. The watched some strange, Oryx like creatures grazing docilely for a while till before Trip began to stroll.

"It's a nice planet." He said softly. "Why can't we visit more planets like these?" Archer chuckled and slapped a hand on his shoulder, falling into step beside him. "I said some awful things."

"I think it was Oscar Wilde who said, 'you always hurt the ones you love.'" Archer said softly, looking back towards where they had left T'pol and Lizzie. The small rise had hidden them but somehow he knew the T'pol wasn't having any more luck getting Lizzie to nap than he had. The Oryx dusted the fields as far as the eye could see. Archer estimated there was over two hundred of them and realised with so many grazing animals, there had to be predators.

"Rialta said this planet didn't have any life on it, didn't she?"

"Musta dropped us off on the wrong planet or something." Trip said, not really paying attention to what Archer was saying, so caught up was he in the frolicking bucks that were making their way towards them. When they had first landed all they had seen for miles around was grass with no animals, so many Oryx hidden behind one crest made him think about what else could be hidden in the tall grass.

"Trip, I think we should head back to T'pol. I have an uneasy feeling."

"They'll be fine. They can always shout if they need help and T'pol has a tricorder with her. I saw her scanning the surroundings when we first landed. She'll take care of herself." Trip rubbed the back of his neck as he looked around, the bucks now playing happily a few feet away. "How long d'ya think we've been here anyway?" He asked, watching as one of the bucks head butted the other in the side and began to bray, standing over it.

"Roughly five, maybe six hours. Why?" Archer said, watching the buck prance away and leaving its fallen comrade behind. The other buck struggled for a while but seemed unable to get up. Archer approached it carefully so as not to startle it and then gently placed its hands beneath its side and helped it back onto its feet. It stood there, blinking at him a moment then it made a curious bleating sound, not unlike a sheep, and pranced away. "What was that Trip?" He turned to face his Engineer who was looking after the buck with some interest.

"Sun's setting. We should get shelter. We don't have any ration packs…." Archer looked after the young buck horrified.

"We can't…_eat_…one. I mean really Trip!"

"Come on, John. We're going to be here a while. Maybe a very long while, we need sustenance." Archer ran a hand through his hair which he was beginning to think was in serious need of a hair cut. He watched as a bull male began to size them up after being circled by the braying and bleating bucks.

"You're right but do _you_ have a phaser?"

"Good point…I suppose we could make spears!" Archer laughed and indicated around them at the almost featureless landscape.

"Out of what?"

"Good point. I suppose we can kill it with dry Vulcan wit then!" Both Trip and Archer laughed as they made their way back towards T'pol. A strange noise caught their attention and they turned back towards the Oryx. Archer half expected to see the bull male charging them but what he saw instead made his blood run cold. A burning star was streaking through the atmosphere, leaving a tail of yellow flame in its wake and you didn't have to be a space Captain to recognise it was a ship.

"Rialta?" Archer gasped, watching it make their way straight for them.

"Enterprise?" Trip said worriedly, watching as it came closer and closer. "That's gonna land real close…we better start running." Trip said urgently, tugging on Archer sleeve. He stood transfixed by the sight a moment then began running back towards T'pol. The impact threw them off their feet and Archer looked back in time to see a giant tsunami of dirt making its way towards them. He threw his hands over his head and prayed to any deity willing to listen.


	12. Race against bovine

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in Tpols arms.

A/N: I know everything comes together a bit fast in this chapter but I didnt see the point in dragging it out and telling you what happens to each and every character when its kinda obvious anyway. Still, hope you enjoy..

_**IOIOIO**_

No sooner had Archer left than Lizzie had slid down to the ravine below. One side was sheer and filled with cracks and crevices where the animals hid, the other sloped up more gently but was all scree making it impossible to climb up without slipping down. Tpol followed her down and watched her chase the little lemur she and Trip had seen earlier around. Since Tpol had no desire to chase after it or her she simply sat down on a rock while Lizzie ran to and fro. Although T'pol had reservations in being in such a constrictive passage way, at her back it slope gradually up till it reached the grasslands, an easy exit, and if worst came to worst her tricorder told her the ravine sloped gently up about a mile and a half down anyway. She briefly wondered what could have caused such an out of place feature in the otherwise featureless landscape around them. Apart from small swells in the land it really was just plain terrain.

Tpol noticed first the slight trembling of the floor beneath her, the little pebbles skittering along the floor and low ominous rumbling coming from behind them. Standing up she turned around and what she saw made her blood run cold. A dust plume was heading straight for them. T'pol had seen plumes such as this but only when the Napel, a racing animal on Vulcan, were stampeding and there weren't any animals in the vicinity…were there? Whipping out her tricorder the readings she saw horrified her. A large mass of life forms were heading straight for her and Lizzie and in the ravine there was no where to run.

"LIZZY!" She shouted, trying to catch her attention. "LIZZY! RUN!" T'pol easily outran the child, scooping her up into her arms as she darted by. She didn't have to look behind to see that the beasts had topped the slope and were heading straight for them. They were gaining ground fast and T'pol couldn't see anywhere safe to hide…unless they could get to one of the ledges on the sheer wall.

"Lizzie, climb up onto that ledge and keep climbing. Whatever you do, don't fall. Hang on no matter what." T'pol said, hoisting the girl up onto her shoulders and sliding her onto a small overhang covered in vines from the grasslands above. She pulled herself up after the child and they began to climb as the peaceful valley below them became a sea of heaving bovine bodies. Lizzie was halfway up when the rock her hand caught came loose and she plummeted below. An instinctive, if illogical, grab for her offspring sent both T'pol and Lizzie plummeting back into the animals below.

_**IOIOIO**_

Archer and Trip ran as fast as their legs would carry them. They had seen the Oryx begin to stampede, spooked by the crash landing, after they had dug themselves out of the dirt but hadn't been able to outrun them to warn T'pol and Lizzie. Why oh why hadn't they brought communicators?

"THERE!" Trip shouted, he was the first to see them, hanging to the ravine wall and trying desperately to climb up.

"NO!" Archer shouted, watching in horror as Lizzie slipped and T'pol plummeted after her into the stampede.

"Oh sweet Jesus, no." Trip breathed as they disappeared. The two scanned the stampede for any sign but could see none.

"THERE!" Archer shouted, pointing to the large boulder T'pol had been resting on earlier. Lizzie clung to it, screaming loudly with tears running down her face. "HOLD ON!" Archer shouted and leapt over the edge, sliding down the loose scree, stopping just before the river of Oryx. Lizzie climbed on top of the rock but when a large Oryx bull scrambled over it she was knocked off. Trip tore his eyes away from his Captain to search for T'pol and saw her clinging to the opposite side of the ravine. She was struck by a bull and torn away, back into the heaving sea only remerge even further down. Her battered body appearing in a brief clearing before she was swallowed up by the running animals. There seemed to be no end to the sweeping hoard and if he didn't get her out now, T'pol wouldn't survive. He slid down the sloping side of the ravine, scree scattering wildly before him before he dove amidst the heaving bodies. He ran with them, down towards where T'pol was. Keeping hold of a young buck's horns he managed to use it to shield himself till he reached T'pol. In one smooth motion he scooped her up and threw her across the same buck's shoulders. The extra weight was slowing it but it was still a lot faster than a human and safe. The barely conscious T'pol clung on for all she was worth and looked up, she wasn't able to shout out warning as a massive bull gored Trip from behind, its horns slicing through Trip's uniform and he dropped like a stone, lost far behind her in the stampede as the buck carried her away.

Archer was having his own problems. He didn't think of running with the Oryx or using one to shield himself and he was tossed about by the bucks and cows that were straggling. He fought his way through and climbed onto the rock with Lizzie, using his own body to cover her. As another buck scrambled over the rock he was hoofed badly in the head and back but he held on, using his body as a shield. Lizzie screamed in terror beneath him, shaking in his grip but he held on, whispering assurances to her. He saw the bovine hoard thinning and scooped Lizzie up, making a break away as an large, old, bull trampled over the rock, his heavy cloven feet cracking huge chunks off it. Archer cradled Lizzie against him as she screamed, running against the thinning tide till he broke free. Only a few straggling young bucks or older, sicker ones making a half hearted lope away. Looking out he saw the carnage of what the stampede had done. The bodies of more than one Oryx lay mangled on the once peaceful ravine floor, more importantly, a navy clad body lay mangled amidst them.

"TRIP!" Archer ran for all he was worth but Lorian got there first. Sliding down the loose scree side and running to his father, a heart wrenching 'No' torn from his already stricken throat. Turning him over Trip was seen to be covered in bruises and gashes, a large wound across his back and thighs testament to the giant bull that had pulled him down. Rialta stood some way away, her arms wrapped around her midriff as she stared on in horror.

"Rialta, no, say it doesn't happen this way." Archer said, turning to her, his eyes tearing up at the sight of his friend. Rialta shook her head.

"I can't tell you…I can't…"

"RIALTA!" She nodded.

"I know he died saving your life…I didn't know. I didn't know!" She sobbed, opening her stricken eyes. Lorian was busy doing chest compressions, trying to restart his fathers heart. Archer stared in horror at Trip as Lorian breathed air into his lungs, willing him to breathe.

"Lorian." Rialta said softly, pleading with his futile efforts. Lorian gave a shake of his head and started chest compressions again. He administered two breaths and Rialta gasped as Trip began to cough and convulse.

"He's alive!" She exclaimed, shock clearly on her features as Trip curled up, coughing out dried blood onto the dusty floor.

"T'pol." He groaned, grabbing onto Lorian for support. Archer stood back up and looked around, his elation at Trip's resurrection overshadowed now by the disappearance of T'pol

"Where's T'pol?" Rialta asked, not seeing her anywhere.

"I don't know, I can't see her among the bodies but…" Archer began but stopped, a sudden awareness sprang to mind and he flinched away. The unaccustomed sensation causing his bodies natural reaction to anything scary. Despite his own injuries he broke off at a run down the ravine the way the Oryx had gone.

"What the…ARCHER!" Rialta loped after him, "ARCHER WAIT!"

"I KNOW WHERE SHE IS! SHE'S IN TROUBLE!" He shouted, racing after the dust plume.

Lorian itched to go with Rialta but he stayed, helping his father. Lizzie came up behind him, still sniffling with tears streaking down her dirt caked face.

"Is Mister Tucker gonna be okay?" She asked, wiping a grimy sleeve across her eyes.

"He needs to get help. Lizzie, you know where the medkit on Rialta's ship is?" The young girl nodded, trying hard to compose herself despite the tremors that still shook her tiny body. "Now I know you've had a big scare but you're going to have to run get it or Mister Tuckers not going to be okay, try and get back here as fast as you can. The ship is just up that slope and over the small rise, now run Lizzie, run." Lorian turned away to reset the broken arm that lay at an odd angle to Trip's body, undoubtedly the source of a lot of discomfort. Lizzie nodded and turned away but before she left she spoke softly.

"I know he's your daddy." She said and ran as fast as her tiny legs would carry her. Lorian pondered the oddness off that statement for only a few seconds and turned back to Trip. He and Rialta had just got there in time, it seemed. Scaron's warbird had taken them by surprise as they made their way to pick Archer up and he had easily shot down their ship. With no where to go but the planet they had managed a somewhat awkward crash landing. After they emerged they had seen the stampeding animals and heard Lizzie's screams even above the thunderous roar. A testament to half-Vulcan hearing and as it were, half-Vulcan screaming.

"Lorian." Trip groaned, one bloodied hand coming up to twist in his collar. "M'boy."

"You're going to be alright. Lizzie is getting the medikit and…" Trip shook his head smiling.

"I'll be alright, but you gotta listen to me. There's some things I shoulda told ya but I wasn't around. Now you gotta hear them. I know you and Rialta care for each other, you have to act on that now or else the chance might slip away and you'll be kicking yourself forever. Did I ever tell you the story of…" He got into a fit of coughing and Lorian cradled him close, begging him to stop talking and to conserve his strength. "No, you gotta hear this. Sometimes, chances in life pass you by and there ain't nothing you can do about it. But do everything you can about it if you can. You understand me."

"I think so, listen, please Tucker, there's something I must tell you…"

"Let me finish boy!" Trip snapped, coughing again. "I love your mother, heart and sole, but we didn't have the opportunities like we had in your timeline. I let her pass me by and you don't know how that's breaking my heart. Don't let Rialta pass you by…"

"Father, I have good news. I wont let her pass me by, in fact, I haven't. She and I are married…" There was a pause and Lorian thought his father had fallen unconscious when Trip began to laugh, he threw back his head and let out a wanton, carefree laugh that would have brightened anyone's spirits if it wasn't from such a battered and bruised body.

"Lorian, m'boy. So that's what took you so long. You eloped to Vegas?" Trip laughed.

"No, no…we just bonded. It was the only way I could save her, Rialta I mean. She…well her species…they…they age faster than humans but…well…she just hit puberty and they have to take a partner then and have a child…"

"…You mean, that sickness that's been affecting Rialta…it was puberty? Damn, I thought I had it bad with a croaking voice and acne but at least it doesn't kill ya." Trip got into another fit of coughing and a fresh wave of nearly black blood leaked out of his side.

"Dammit, where is Lizzie." Lorian groaned, pulling off his jumper and tearing it in half, using it as a crude binding on his side.

"Hell boy, did you say bonding or bondage? Your backs covered in scrawl marks." Lorian straightened up and immediately regretting taking his shirt off. Still, his fathers health was more important than his modesty. So what, he was damned if he couldn't copulate with his wife. Wife, he hadn't really thought of her like that until now…Some honeymoon.

"Stop talking and save your strength." Lorian snapped, worried at the paleness of his fathers skin and the blueness of his lips.

"I've lost too much blood, I feel weak. If I use my last breath embarrassing my son then so be it. I want one of my grandkids to be names after me, mind. The Charles Tucker tradition is a long one. You shoulda been called Charles."

"It's my middle name, and if our child's a boy I'll call him after you." Lorian promised, praying for Lizzie's speedy return.

"Your only going to have one? Don't. Have lots. Have at least five, but don't let John tell ya how to name them. He'd probably call one Dartangion or something strange like that…"

"I hope to have a large family but I'm taking it one child at a time." Trip stayed quiet a while, finding it hard to stay conscious.

"You mean you've already…"  
"The Katarian gestation period is about ten months. Rialta says it's a girl but I don't think she can possibly know this early on. It wasn't a bonding required to break her illness it was…" Lorian looked uncomfortable. "Fertilisation. The bonding was a by product of being so deep in her mind during…Surely you know all this." Trip smiled at him and winked before weakness over came him.

_**IOIOIO**_

"John! JOHN!" Rialta ran for all she was worth but the last few hours had been…strenuous, to say the least and although the inertial dampeners on her ship were good, she had still injured her leg in the crash landing. "JOHN! SCARON'S PATROLS WILL BE ALL OVER THIS PLACE IN MINUTES! WE HAVE TO GET YOU OUT OF HERE!"

"I know T'pol is close, I can…I can feel it." He panted as he ran. His side ached painfully and he sported more injuries than the adrenaline pumping through his system was allowing him to feel. Rialta could see the dark patches on his uniform and although he wasn't as bad as Trip, she could tell that he couldn't go on much farther. Catching his arm she spun him around and held him tightly by the biceps.

"John, please, we have to get you out of here. They're not looking for T'pol. Please, come with me and ––." She was cut off by laughter that echoed around the ravine they were in and looking up she saw T'pol being held loosely like a rag doll against a giant Klingon's arm.

"Mohgrak." Rialta said, turning slowly. "Let her go."

"I don't think so, Rialta. I've signalled Scaron, he and the others will be here shortly and all of you will be exterminated." Rialta sighed and broke into a grin.

"Klingons," She sighed, "all major in amateur dramatics you know. It's a mandatory subject in school along with ridge maintenance and growling." Rialta pointed at the Klingon and began to laugh. As the Klingon puffed himself up in rage a beam lanced from her hand and hit him square in the chest sending him tumbling down the loose scree and onto the ravine floor. Archer immediately ran to T'pol's side, glancing up at Rialta in awe.

"How did you do that?"

"Wrist phaser, look." She indicated the large silver bracelet she had on. Archer smiled at the far more obvious answer than spontaneous laser beams shooting out of her hands. He levered the Klingon off T'pol's prone body and gathered her up in his arms.

"How did you get that mark?" Archer asked as he secured his hold on T'pol.

"What mark?" Rialta asked as she scanned the ridge, conscious of the Klingons threat that there'd be more coming.

"On your neck, it looks like a…like a bite mark!" Rialta's hand slapped over it.

"Pesky lemurs. We better go before anyone else gets here…" Lizzie appeared on the lip of the ravine and began to climb down, something slung over her shoulder as she scaled the wall with far too much ease. What did that child get up to in her timeline? When she hit the floor she turned and smiled at Archer but her smile soon turned into a look of shock.

"DADDY!" She screamed and ran forward, Archer turned in time to see the green beam streaking towards him and he was able to dodge out of the way only to watch in horror as the beam struck Lizzie.

"I have you now." Scaron stood on the lip of the ravine, high up with six armed officers behind him. "Open fire!"


	13. Tempus Fugit

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

A/N: I know! I know! I took forever! Seriously, it's NOT my fault. I had to come to an internet café in town and write and post this! That's how dedicated I am to you people. Lol, never mind. Anyway, here it is. The last chapter and it's pretty long so that should make up for it, just about. Anyway, enough from me. On to le fic.

_**IOIOIO**_

"LIZZIE!" Archer and Rialta shouted in unison, both moving to aid the fallen child. Scaron's phaser spat up the dirt as it cut a line between Lizzie and her protectors, a warning shot that stopped them dead in their tracks.

"Don't move." Scaron snarled, smiling triumphantly over them. "I'd hate to have to kill you to Rialta. After all, you do make such an intriguing adversary. I would like to play you at a game of Ba'chak some time but maybe that would take too much brain skill for a 22nd Century Katarian."

"Oh please, I outsmarted you at every turn. You got lucky." Rialta said with a grin, trying to act casual and relaxed. "Or maybe this is all going to my plan. You are falling into the trap I set to get you out into the open so I could finish you once and for all." Scaron snorted with laughter and looked around with a grin on his face.

"I'm sure…any second now the trap's going to spring shut, right?" He looked around dramatically and threw back his head with laughter. "Now, gloating over you, as fun as it would be, is not why I'm here. You, Mister Archer, are the reason why I'm here. To fix all you put wrong with my universe." He aimed his phaser and Rialta cast an eye around for any help but only the cracked beige walls of the ravine greeted her. Not even a lemur in sight.

"How do you know the universe created in my death will work in your favour? How do you know that it wont create something even more twisted and horrible than the universe you live in now?"

"I may not make a paradise from your death but anything is better than the hand holding, molly coddling universe I am now forced to exist in." Scaron aimed the phaser, snarling at Archer.

"You're twisted." Archer spat. "Have you thought about what other people want? Universal peace is the goal of _all_ living beings." Archer protested, stepping forward. Scaron merely yawned and fired.

"NO!" Rialta screamed and pushed him out of the way, the beam slicing the air between them. She rolled on top of Archer, covering his body with hers as fully as she could. "I can't let you do this! I can't let you destroy any hope of peace!"

"Get off him Rialta, my quarrel is not with you. In fact, I'll let you and the brat go after I've finished with Archer. I can be a merciful man."

"I can't let you do this!" She shouted, burying her face in Archers shoulder and shaking. She was crying.

"Rialta, get off. I'll except my fate." Archer said, trying to shift her off of him.

"I can't, even if it means my death and the death of my…I just can't. What kind of a future would be there for the children of Enterprise if your not there to shape it for them?"

"Someone else will shape the future. Peace is inevitable. Rialta, get off!" Archer manage to roll onto his front, pinning Rialta beneath him.

"ARCHER! NO!" She screamed, trying to push him away. She heard Scaron's laughter as he no doubt took aim again. She looked over and saw Lizzie watching them. Her eyes open and unseeing as the blood poured from the gash in her chest

"SCARON! NO! IT'S NOT MEANT TO HAPPEN LIKE THIS! LORIAN! LORIAN!" She began to scream his name at the top of her lungs, thrashing in Archers grip.

"Who's Lorian?" Scaron asked, looking around for any sign of another person.

"Perhaps it is merely a curse in her language." The Vulcan behind him offered. "I suggest you dispatch of them quickly." Scaron nodded and took aim, the green beam piercing the air with a resonant hum. Rialta grabbed Archer by the shoulders and folding her legs up beneath him, kicked him off her. The beam lanced straight through her stomach creating a searing, bloodless hole in her abdomen. She doubled over in pain, screaming in pure agony as she clutched at the injury before, in a haze of green sparkles the rest of her body disappeared. The energy disintegrating ever molecule in her body.

"RIALTA!" John shouted, his hands scuffling the dirt where she had lain moments before. There was a roar of rage and the next thing Archer saw was two blurs rolling down the scree of the ravine. Lorian landed pinion and sat astride Scaron, and began to beat him wherever he could reach, the face, the chest, the stomach, each blow staining his fist emerald with the Romulan's blood until Scaron lay unconscious. A beam lanced across his back, tearing into his olive skin and sending a spray of blood across the scree as the Vulcan fired his phaser. Lorian lay motionless across a writhing Scaron and the only ones left standing were Archer with a phaser at his feet, a Vulcan, a human and a strange, blue coloured alien he'd never come across before, all pointing phasers at him.

"Alright, maybe we can come to a compromise gentleman. I'll resign my commission, go to a remote planet, stay there till the end of my days never forging the Federation. Sound good?" The Vulcan smiled. An action that chilled Archer to the bone. It didn't look natural on his face, it looked manufactured and sinister as his arm rose and he aimed the phaser.

"I think not." He teased. The green beam lanced out and that was the last thing Archer knew as he was blown back, disintegrating from the phaser. Lorian stirred on the dirt, trying to rise to his feet.

"I don't think so." The blue alien fired and Lorian too disappeared in a crackle of green energy leaving the bodies of T'pol and Lizzie lying there. The Bolian and the human slid down the scree to pick up Scaron, hosing him up between them and tapping their badges for a beam out. The Vulcan watched them go before sliding down the scree himself. Without any tricorder on him he had no way of telling if the bodies were alive or dead so he'd dispatch of them the old fashioned way. He made his way over to Lizzie, crouching down next to her and pressing his fingers against her neck, feeling for a pulse. He could find none but that was irrelevant as the sharp blade of a bath' let pierced him through the abdomen. The phaser fell from his hand as the pain spasmed through his body and he turned to see T'pol standing over him before his vision darkened. T'pol tossed him aside and picked up Lizzie in her arms. The girls body was still warm but unresponsive and her cool, blue eyes were misted over in death.

T'pol felt as if she'd just been kicked in the gut. How could this have happened? How could her little girl, a little girl she hadn't even had yet, be dead in her arms! T'pol felt a burning start in her stomach that travelled up her throat and nose to sting her eyes as she did something that she hadn't done since she had held her own mother in her arms. She cried. She knew it wouldn't be long before they sent down others to look for the missing Vulcan she had just killed. She wasn't quite sure what had happened but what she did know that Scaron must be close…what if he had John? T'pol tore herself away from the corpse of her child, looking down into her pretty elfin face. She looked so much like John…Where was he? She remembered him and Trip coming down into the ravine after her and Lizzie…Trip! Oh god, she remembered him in the stampede, he had saved her then a bull…oh no! She ran as fast as she could down the ravine, leaving Lizzie's body far behind only to come upon Trip's. He lay motionless, Lorian's beloved blue shirt wrapped around his torn waist. T'pol fell to her knees beside him and took his head into her lap. He was cold to the touch and his eyes were closed in peace. He was dead. T'pol bent over him and placed a kiss on his forehead. He had loved her. Why she didn't know, and all of a sudden she didn't feel deserving of such a devotion. He had died for her.

Still, there would be time for grieving later. She had to find John and the others. If Scaron had them he'd soon kill them. Where were they? What did she have to lose by calling out, they might be close but Scaron's men might also be near. Were they already dead?

T'pol saw the lemur from earlier peak his head out of a crack and come scampering towards her. Boldly, it took hold of Trip's sleeve and ripped some blue material away, scampering to the nearby rock and trying to eat it. T'pol scrambled back, horrified as the impact hit her. They were dead! She was the only one left alive and it was only a matter of time before she became food for the lemur's too. If Lorian's shirt was wrapped around Trip then Lorian and Rialta had to have landed on the planet. The crash that had caused the stampede! That must have been Rialta's ship crash landing. It was worth a try at least.

Leaving Trip's body behind, T'pol ran up the slope out of the ravine and onto the grassy slopes. She ran as fast as her legs would carry her till she crested the rise of a slight hill, following the smoke, and came across Rialta's crashed ship. It was a wreck, the impact causing severe damage all along its red and gold hull. There was no way it would be space worthy without a few weeks in space dock at least but it had sensors. If they were still working then maybe she'd have a chance of finding John and the others…if they were still alive. She ran down the hill and to the ship, stepping in through a hole in the hull. Inside was a wreck of sparking panels and a strange, clear gel that felt like jello as T'pol walked on it. She sat into the remaining chair and tried to access sensors. The system was so complex and foreign that even if she had managed to bring them on line she'd never be able to understand the readouts. She banged a frustrated fist on the panel, how could everything be going so wrong! It wasn't meant to be like this…

"Need some help?" She spun around at the voice to find a strange man lounging against the back of the ship. His skin had a deep tan and his dark hair was a little looser than the Vulcan bowl cut. His brows and ears said he was Vulcan but the slouch and smile, not to mention the strange clothes, told an entirely different story. He wore dark black pants and a tunic with grey shoulders and a blue shirt underneath. Two shiny gold pips and one black sparkled on his collar and a broach of come description was pinned on his chest.

"Who are you?" T'pol asked, trying to regain her calm but there was a hint of panic in her voice. The man smiled and tossed his head in a way designed to get hair out of your eyes though his fringe wasn't in the way. He gave a fussy sigh as if it were all some game and stretched out his hand.

"You can call me, Savock. Most do." T'pol regarded his hand sceptically but decided not to take it. The man shrugged and kicked off from the wall, sauntering past her. "Oh, what a mess. This was my wife's ship, you know. It's a Lenian design but it was built by…oh, what were their names. It's not important. All the glyphs you see are in Leni. They're far more evolved than us, they can process more information at any one time you see so all this cacophony makes perfect sense to them."

"Rialta's not a…Leni, is she?" T'pol asked, watching his fingers dance across the controls.

"Nope, she's Katarian I believe. Intriguing race. They, like the Leni, can process more information at once than Vulcans or Klingons or even Talosians and as you well know, Talosians are one of the most mentally evolved races in the galaxy." T'pol didn't want to tell him that she, in fact, didn't know, but let him babble on. "V'lena taught her how to use the controls. Now, she'll kill me if she finds out if I'm here. Not meant to interfere you see, us higher beings." He chuckled as if he found something funny. "I hate that term. Just because we exist on a different plane doesn't mean we're any better or worse, just…different. Still, we're not allowed interfere in the matters of corporal beings anymore. When Scaron travelled back of course we gave corporal beings a little…nudge in the right direction. It wasn't really interfering just…nudging." He flashed her a pearly grin that T'pol thought would leave spots dancing in front of her eyes for the rest of her life. "You see, it's harder for the ones who used to be corporal like myself. I was a T'khasian, do you know what that is?"

"It is the ancient term for Vulcan. Used prewars." T'pol said, watching him work. A pre-Surak Vulcan explained a lot about this man.

"Bingo but I wasn't born before the wars. I was born in a time which will come to be known as the Birth of Peace, unfortunately that's many hundreds of years away from this timeline. T'khasian is a term used to describe a half Vulcan and a half Sundered. I believe you call them…Romulans."

"Romulans! They're the sundered?" T'pol asked, shock and horror on her face. Savock nodded, smiling.

"Yes, Scaron's a Romulan but don't tell anyone I told you. Now, this ship isn't going to be flying any time soon but I translated the entire database into Vulcan. Now, if you just happen to go back in time and fix what Scaron changed then that's your own damn business. All I did was translate the database and chat with you. Didn't interfere at all." He smiled at her and stretched out a hand. "It was good to see you again." T'pol took it this time and shook it.

"We met before?"

"Another time line, another dimension. You're related to my wife…vaguely. Plus, as a guardian of the timeline I find it useful to keep an eye on the key figures of the universe."

"A key figure of the universe? But I'm just a Science Officer." T'pol protested, Savock smiled at her again.

"They tend to be the most important, especially the Vulcan ones. Somehow, getting a Vulcan Science Officer and a Human Captain in a Starship called Enterprise has major influences on the fabric of the time space continuum. Who knows why?" He gave a shrug and ran a hand through his dark hair. "I've already stayed too long. I'll probably be seeing you again in a decade or so. I'm not sure if Quinn can pull it off by herself so I might need to do some more nudging. I'll be sure to drop in and say hi if I'm in the timeline. Oh, and you might need this." He handed her a tricorder and plucked the broach off his chest. "Just tap it once."

"Who's Quinn?" T'pol asked but already Savock had disappeared. T'pol turned back to the readouts and saw familiar Vulcan spirals racing up and down the screen. All of a sudden, the green lines that crisscrossed the screen made sense and T'pol followed the course Savock had plotted in. There was the sensation of falling then T'pol found herself standing in the ravine, the surroundings of the trashed ship gone. Looking down she saw the lemur scampering along and heard raised voices. She reached down and scooped up the creature, holding it as she listened. The voices were clearly hers and Trip.

"Don't be so obtuse. I have no wish to discuss this matter further."

"Fine!" Trip snapped. "Dammit, all you ever seem to do is hide your emotions. Push people away. But I guess that's all Vulcans are good for." T'pol saw Trip marching off and knew it wouldn't be long before Archer showed up. She had to get out of the gorge and down to where she had found Lizzie's body. The very thought of it made her throat constrict. She wouldn't let it happen, she wouldn't let her daughter die. T'pol let the lemur down and ran off towards the end of the gorge. She slid down the scree like side of the gorge, breaking into a run down the canyon to where she thought she had found the child's body. Looking around she couldn't find anywhere to hide when the Oryx like things stampeded so she proceeded to scale the craggy rock face on the other side, lying down in the tall, waving grass and peering down into the ravine. It wouldn't be long now…What had he meant about tapping it once? She turned the badge over in her hands and frowned, tapping it with her index once. The badge gave a little chirp and an all too familiar voice emanated from the silver, arrow cover. All of a sudden she knew what to do.

IOIOIO 

"John! JOHN!" Rialta shouted bringing T'pol's attention to the two racing down the canyon. Rialta was limping and clutching at her thigh. "JOHN! SCARON'S PATROLS WILL BE ALL OVER THIS PLACE IN MINUTES! WE HAVE TO GET YOU OUT OF HERE!"

"I know T'pol is close, I can…I can feel it." He panted as he ran. T'pol watched him from the ridge, his side bled through the uniform and he was covered in cuts and bruises. Rialta caught him by the arm and spun him to face her.

"John, please, we have to get you out of here. They're not looking for T'pol. Please, come with me and ––." She was cut off by laughter that echoed around the ravine they were in and looking up, T'pol saw her past self being held loosely like a rag doll against a giant Klingon's arm.

"Mohgrak." Rialta said, turning slowly. "Let her go."

"I don't think so, Rialta. I've signalled Scaron, he and the others will be here shortly and all of you will be exterminated." Rialta sighed and broke into a grin.

"Klingons," She sighed, "all major in amateur dramatics you know. It's a mandatory subject in school along with ridge maintenance and growling." Rialta pointed at the Klingon and began to laugh. As the Klingon puffed himself up in rage a beam lanced from her hand and hit him square in the chest sending him tumbling down the loose scree and onto the ravine floor. Archer immediately ran to the past T'pol's side, glancing up at Rialta in awe.

"How did you do that?"

"Wrist phaser, look." She indicated the large silver bracelet she had on. Archer smiled and levered the Klingon off the other T'pol's prone body, gathering her up in his arms. T'pol crouched down low in the grass, scanning the ridge for any sign of Scaron and the others.

"Now Lizzie, go." T'pol urged the girl who was lying next to her. She hated sending her down to do this, especially after what she saw last time but there was no one here who could help apart from her and T'pol was severely outnumbered.

When Lizzie hit the floor she turned and smiled at Archer, indicating that he should close his eyes. Rialta turned at the sound of falling scree to see Scaron on the lip of the ravine, high up with six armed officers behind him. "Open fire!"

"NOW LIZZIE NOW!" The future T'pol shouted and the girl cracked open the 'med kit', a blinding flash and deafening bang bursting forth.

Scaron and the others threw their arms over their eyes, firing blindly. T'pol stayed low and set off three well placed lasers dropping the Scaron, the Bolian and Human but the Vulcan's inner eyelid had protected him from the blast as T'pol's had and he was able to dodge, sliding down the scree and firing towards T'pol's hiding place. Archer and Rialta were on the floor blind, writhing in pain from the high pitch scream that still rang in their ears from the flash bang. Even the Vulcan was twitching, his face screwed up in pain but he had more than enough control to continue. He grabbed Lizzie, securing his hand around her waist and hoisting her up. He used her almost as a living shield, covering his body as he took aim at T'pol. She took aim, her beam on low stun so that any mistake wouldn't harm Lizzie. Before she had a chance to fire, however, Lorian came barrelling down the scree, a rock held high above his head. He brought it down on the back of the Vulcan's head dropping him like a stone with Lizzie and his phaser tumbling out of his hands.

"Are you alright T'pol?" He asked as she made her way down the sheer wall that made up the other side of the cliff.

"Trip?" She asked, fear turning her stomach to ice.

"There's nothing more I can do for him…What is wrong with Captain Archer and Rialta?" Archer and Rialta were still on the floor, their faces masks of pain with eyes squeezed shut and hands pressed firmly over ears.

"I told them close their eyes." Lizzie said, rising and dusting herself off. "Here Lorian, the med kit." She handed him the small briefcase with a caduceus emblazoned on the front.

"It's too late. Nothing short of Enterprise could heal him now." Lorian said, sadness tingeing his voice. T'pol lifting her wrist to her mouth, an arrow head pin clipped to her cuff.

"Malcolm, what is your estimated time of arrival?"

"We're five minutes away at high warp, what's your status Commander."

"If you don't get here in two minutes, Commander Tucker will die."

"Two minutes? I don't think even he could coax that out of the engines! We're already at well over maximum warp. Lt. Henderson is having kittens about the expected overload! …I'll do my best." T'pol tapped the badge and lowered her wrist.

"…Do you think that'll be enough time?" T'pol asked but Lorian didn't have to speak to tell her the answer. T'pol looked up in time to see Savock standing on the rise. He turned away with a sad shake of his head and disappeared from view.

"I don't want your daddy to die." Lizzie said, wrapping an arm around one of Lorian's legs. "Can't Rialta's ship help?" Lorian shook his head.

"It's a scout ship, all it has is a med kit." A movement in the corner of his eye alerted him to the Vulcan's newfound consciousness. He turned, ready to give him another whack when the Vulcan dived for the phaser. Lorian was on him in a second and the two wrestled back and forth, battling for control of the phaser. Several shots were fired harmlessly into the air, one not so harmlessly. Lizzie scream pierced the air causing both Lorian and T'pol to turn. She fell back, her hands over her face and screaming. A horrible image of glassy eyes clouded over in death flashed before T'pol's eyes and she vowed not to let that happen again. The Vulcan threw Lorian off of him and swung the phaser on T'pol. Without thinking Lorian dived and knocked his mother out of the way as a shot rended the air. Looking over his shoulder he saw the Vulcan sitting up, the phaser tumbling from his hands and a hole burned straight through his chest. Rialta lay on the ground, not to far away, on her stomach with one hand stretched out, her wrist phaser still glowing from the high charged beam. Her eyes were yellow, puffed, bloodshot and in narrow slits from the pain in her head but their cold blue was trained angrily on the Vulcan as he fell back to the floor, dead. Lorian left his mother and ran to his wife's side, helping her to her feet.

"Lizzie." She said breathlessly and Lorian moved to the child. She lay curled up in the foetal position, hands over her face.

"Lizzie." He cooed, taking hold of her wrists. "Lizzie, say something."

"It hurts." Came a weak reply and prying her hands away from her face he saw the damage. The beam had not struck her full on but actually glanced her cheek leaving a livid green furrow about as thick as his thumb across her alabaster skin.

"It's alright, Enterprise will be here soon. Everything will be okay." Lorian said, gathering her up into his arms. Lizzie wrapped her arms around his neck and began to cry.

"I want my daddy! I want my daddy! DADDY! DADDY!" Lorian tried to sooth her, rubbing her back and hair but it was no use, she was hysterical.

T'pol moved to Archers side but without Rialta's regenerative properties he was still blind and deaf. She reached out and touched his face, fingers brushing lightly over his cheek and even though he could not see who it was, something inside him told him to be calm. That's when clarity struck. The reason why he had known where T'pol was, the reason how he knew T'pol had touched his face, the reason why all the pieces were beginning to fit. The memory he had lost was coming back. He remembered going to her bed chamber. Telling her about their two sons and her turning on him, over powering him with a fierce Vulcan strength that sent tremors through his body even now…then…then there was a blinding, searing pain in his mind and he had felt what she felt, known what she had known, two hearts beat as one, two minds thought as one, two souls together as one…two bodies. Oh good lord…Had anything happened? He remember there was intent. T'pol was determined to take him and lets face it, he wasn't exactly going to put up much a fight…but then Trip had been there. T'pol had been just as displeased as him…she had neck pinched him. Ha! It was all falling into place now! All coming together. He and T'pol…oh god, what was he thinking. She was his subordinate and they had melded, were still joined of the mind. He closed his eyes and concentrated, reaching out to her, begging to know what was going on…for once his cries were heard and someone answered his call. They told him everything was going to be okay, that Enterprise was here and Scaron would be no more trouble.

_**IOIOIO**_

Malcolm paced from one length of sickbay to the other. Hoshi followed him with her eyes. Back and forth, back and forth, back and forth.

"Malcolm, will you stop. You're making me dizzy!" She snapped finally, slamming a hand down. Malcolm swung around to face her, his face like thunder.

"They've been in there for hours. What if he doesn't make it." Malcolm snapped right back before he began to worry down his thumb nail. Captain Archer, Rialta, Lorian and Lizzie lay sedated on the beds beside them but Trip was still in the operating theatre. He'd been in there for nearly ten hours. "I should have been there with them. I should have gone with them. I'm the Security Officer, I'm meant to keep people secure! It's in the job description. Very first line! I saw Rialta's ship go into the nebula with Scaron's ship behind her. I could have gone back in but no, I waited. Six hours I had to act but I just sat in my chair and did nothing!"

"Malcolm sit down! You'll wear a hole in the deck plating."

"I failed in my duty as Security Officer." He said, sinking wearily onto the end of Lizzie's bed.

"No you didn't. You got here in time to save them, I was you who negotiated with the warbird in orbit, you who got our crew members back safely even thought that warbird could have blasted out of space at any time."

"They wanted to return home, the majority of the crew was on the planet and their weapons were offline from the fight with Rialta's ship. It didn't take a great deal of negotiation. I still want to know how a scout managed to do that much damage to a warbird. I mean the weaponry on her ship must be incredible."

"You and your weaponry." She laughed, smiling up at him. "Don't worry Malcolm. Everything is going to be alright." She stretched out her hand and caught his, giving it a reassuring squeeze.

"I'm glad I have you, at least, Hoshi." He said, kissing the tips of her fingers in old, English gentlemanly fashion. Hoshi smiled at him and stood up, taking him by the hand.

"Come on Malcolm, lets get something to eat. I'm sure Dr. Phlox will call us if there is any development. Plus, I think Porthos is well over due a check in, he must be worried sick about John." Malcolm made a noncommittal noise and followed Hoshi out of sickbay.

"Those two are so cute." Rialta said, looking over at Lorian.

"I can't say I've thought about it." Lorian muttered, opening his eyes and turning his head to look at Rialta. "You're so beautiful." He said suddenly, reaching out a hand to stroke her cheek. "You don't…regret this, do you? I mean, I did…Well, it wasn't like we had talked about it before hand or…" Rialta placed a finger against his lips and smiled.

"How could you ask a question like that when you've been in my mind, when you know me better than anyone in the world. How could you think for one second that I've ever wanted anything else? What do you think all that fighting was about?"

"You're not a very agreeable person in general." Lorian teased, a smile tugging at the corner of his lips. It earned him a smack on the forehead and Rialta turned away.

"Fine, be that way." Lorian smirked and reached across, running a single finger down her neck. He'd have been lying if he said it was anything less than gratifying when he felt her shiver.

"So you don't regret it, not even a little. You're stuck with me for life you know." Rialta turned back to face him, smiling.

"I wouldn't have it any other way, Techie, I love you." She shifted in the bed, reached across the divide between them and swinging her upper body off the bed, Lorian did the same and placed a soft kiss on her lips.

"I've never known happiness before now, I think I now realise why my human side has yearned for love so, even my Vulcan heritage can not deny all I feel for you, Aisha."

"Aisha?"

"Beloved." He kissed her again but when the doors to the surgery opened they both pulled back like children caught stealing cookies. Phlox came out, his scrubs red with blood.

"Doctor?" Lorian asked, sitting up, worry creasing his slanted brows.

"I'm not sure. I've done all I can, I'm now officially out of all O blood and all A+. I'll have to call in a vampire run to replenish the stocks later." He stripped off the gloves and apron. "He's sustained a lot of internal damage and is very weak…There's no way of telling if he'll pull through or not but Mister Tucker's will to live is strong. Of anyone on the crew I'd say he has the best chance to live. Now, about ye…" Phlox grinned, perching himself on the end of Rialta's bed. "Have you thought of a name?"

"A name?" Rialta asked, "Why, no, not really. How did you know?"

"These are more than just beds, your baby is already forming alarmingly fast. I'd say he, or she, will be here in just over five months."

"Five?" Both Lorian and Rialta said at the same time.

"Yes, five, why?"  
"But I thought since it was a part Vulcan child that…well…it would take longer, like…ten! The normal Katarian gestation period is six and humans are nine and Vulcan's are ten so I thought that…I thought…I don't know what I thought. She'll be here in no time!"

"You are sure it's going to be a girl?" Phlox asked.

"Of course, all Katarian first born are girls. They just always are…I didn't think about naming it…Lorian?"

"Charlie. I promised my father I call my child Charles but if it's a girl…"

"That would make her the fifth Charles Tucker." Phlox chuckled. "I wonder what they'd call her for short. Commander Tucker is Trip, which would make you Quad and her Quinn I suppose." Phlox chuckled and stood. "Congratulations for both of you, you'll make wonderful parents." Phlox patted Rialta on the knee and stood, moving over to check on Lizzie's wound. Lorian reached across and took Rialta's hand, their index and middle fingers brushing in a caress that was almost sacred to Vulcan couples. He was going to be a father, the thought was almost incredulous, he was going to be a father!

"It's over." Rialta sighed, sinking back into the cushions, only their fingers linking them. "It's finally over. What are we going to do now, Techie? I'll have to bring Rialta back to her timeline and then you'll have to go back to your dimension…"

"Each day as it comes, aduna, each day as it comes."

"You know, the one thing I hate about being a time traveller is the fact you never have enough time." Lorian smiled and sank back onto his bed.

"Truer words have never been spoken. We've got a long recovery ahead of us. Let's make the best of the time we have." A young nurse entered and set down trays on their beds.

"Doctor Phlox said you might be hungry." She said, arranging the ware and turning to leave.

"A toast." Rialta said, taking her cup of juice and raising it with a joking grin.

"To what?"

"To time, to us and to the children of this crazy enterprise." She said, offering her class. Lorian tapped hers with his.

"To the Children of Enterprise."

_**IOIOIO**_

A/N: Hope you enjoyed it. This is the last chapter butI can't really leave it there can I? There'll be an epilogue, don't worry. Anyway, I hope you've enjoyed reading this as much as I have enjoyed writing it. Who knows what'll happen, I'm in the Christmas spirit. Oh, and on that note. Whether you're reading this in January, March, June or July (Maybe even December : )MERRY CHRISTMAS!


	14. Epilogue

Children of Enterprise

Estellio

Rating: Pg-13 (T)

Summary: When Archer is kidnapped by unknown aliens and the Enterprise is dead in the water, it seems like there is no hope for rescue but there's more to this than meets the eye and it could have something to do with the child in T'pol's arms.

A/N: Yeah, Savock is the reincarnation of Garth Brooks…ah well, it's a good song. You'll see what I mean at the end of this, the stuff about the fire all stemmed from a really good Garth Brooks song called 'Standing outside the fire' I love this song so much and it always makes me think of Star Trek. Even if you're not a Brooks or a Country and Western fan listen to this song. It's a good 'un : )

_**IOIOIO**_

Archer patted Porthos gently on the head before he left to do his rounds. After two months of extensive over hauling and repairs, Rialta's ship was about as repaired as it was going to get in this century and finally, she and Lorian had a way of returning to their respective timelines. Archer wasn't sure why the people who'd given Rialta the ship and sent her on this little misadventure hadn't come to pick her up, even though Rialta had jokingly suggested, with much winking and smirking, that her job wasn't done yet. Archer really didn't think he could take much more of all this time travelling nonsense. Daniels was one thing but really…Rialta was too much! In the two months since the capture of Scaron, who was lying in their brig, strapped down and being fed intravenously not to mention heavily tranq'd, Rialta had begun to show her pregnancy heavily and Archer didn't even try and speculate when she and 'Techie' jammed in the time to conceive a child but where Vulcans were concerned, he avoided that topic like the plague. Trip was still in sickbay. Even though Phlox had done what he could for his body, Trip had fallen deep into a coma and he worried that even if he did come out of it, which was not too likely at this stage, he'd have severe brain damage. In the last week he had been run off his feet.

When Enterprise hadn't turned up at the Andorian Starbase, Corellis, six weeks ago then Starfleet had sent its two ships, The Columbia and The Icarus to find them. Enterprise has spent a week in the temporal null, then the attack from the ships had left Enterprise damaged and Rialta's ship…well…completely trashed. While Enterprise had sustained negligible damage considering the ships they'd been up against, passing so close to the corona of a star had fried about 40 of Enterprises circuitry then the damage sustained on the brief firing by Scaron's ship had blown out the majority of Enterprises systems with the last straw being the damage caused by pushing Enterprises already bruised engines hard to get to the planet on time. They'd barely made it. Long range communications were out, along with propulsion and everything except life support which had power from everywhere on the ship being routed to it. The last two months had meant, not only an overhaul on Rialta's ship but major repairs to Enterprise which would have to be confined to spacedock for the next few months at least. All this was hampered by the fact their Chief Engineer was comatose which left the entire of Engineering and, of course, the rest of the ship with a serious morale low. Actually, come to think of it, John had been so caught up in work that he'd been rather negligent in his duties as a friend. At first he had visited Trip every day, if only for an hour or two, and prayed to any god willing to listen that he'd wake up. The last six days Archer had been so run ragged that from the moment he woke up he was in the thick of work right up until he fell unconscious on the bed, usually still fully clothed. He spent the majority of his time over on the Columbia with Captain Hernandez over seeing repairs on his dilapidated ship. Reed had done a good job, he was planning on recommending his beloved English armoury office for a promotion, but next time he was leaving Hoshi in charge. For the sake of the ship you see. Trip was on the Icarus with Doctor Phlox and Doctor…he refused to even try and pronounce the Felucian's name. Apparently there was a funny story to how she got to be CMO on the ship but Archer really wasn't interested, at least not now. Phlox and his female friend, who Archer thought looked a bit like a hairless bird with a fleshy beak and pinched pink skin, had taken it upon themselves to tend to Trip. With Enterprise in such poor repair, the critical Trip had been sent to the far more advanced sickbay on the Icarus. To be honest it was not exactly what he would have called the peach monstrosity. It had none of his sickbay's charm with Phlox' many, incredible animals that just gave the place a positive atmosphere which Archer believed really did speed up the healing process. The sickbay in the Icarus, he supposed, was meant to be cheery but really just looked like a waiting room for a psychiatrists office. Not that he'd know anything about those but after this he was sure he'd start learning.

Looking around the sickbay appeared empty, something Phlox' menagerie never was, and without Phlox or Birdlady around Archer headed straight for Trip's curtained off bed. A steady, rhythmic thumping resounded through the sickbay and Archer didn't even try to fathom what strange machine they had his friend on this time. Pulling the pink curtain aside John was immediately struck with a ball.

"'Sup?"

"TRIP!" Archer stood there, stunned, the ball clutched in his hands. Pale, gaunt, a little worse for wear but blessedly conscious sat Trip, smirking his usual smirk and the all too familiar glint in his sunken eyes.

"'Bout time you showed up." He teased, indicating for Archer to throw the ball back. In the last two months he'd lost so much weight that John feared passing the ball might break him in two so instead he sat it on a nearby tray and perched himself on the edge of the bed.

"How long have you been awake?"

"Four days." Trip said, easing himself back into the pillows and giving the ball a last rueful look. "Can't feel anything below my waist. Kinda…disconcerting. Doc says that my body took quite the ripping and he's surprised I lived for them to get there at all. He patched me up best he could but until we get to the Medical Centre orbiting Denoblia he doesn't know if he can repair all the damage done to my legs. Says I'm gonna have some pretty wicked scars though. Bet the chicks back home will go right for them." Archer couldn't help but laugh, the laugher bubbling to near hysterics with relief. "Jeese, John, it wasn't that funny."

"Christ sake, Trip. I saw you lying there…the damage you took. I didn't think anyone could survive that but I didn't stay with you, Trip, I didn't stay. I went to find T'pol."

"She was carried away by the stampede, that much I remember. You were right to go find her. There was nothing you could have done for me. M'boy was looking out for me. Did you know that he and Rialta are gonna have a kid?" Trip asked, shaking his head with a grin. "Me, a granddaddy."

"Yeah, Rialta's showing it pretty heavily." Trip's eyes widened but he didn't move, fatigue already showing on his face. He was just out of a two month long coma for crying out loud.

"What in the blue blazes! How long 'ave I been out?"

"She's only two months along, Trip. I don't know why she ballooned like she did and quite frankly, I don't want to know." He chuckled, throwing his hands up in defence and wiping a tear of laughter from the corner of his eye. "I think she's about to crack though, having Lorian practically carrying her everywhere."

"Poor kid. He likes things to go according to plan, making out with Rialta in the back of the ship wasn't exactly on his priority list I don't think. Well, it most likely was but not in the middle of a crisis situation with the lives of all his loved ones hanging in the balance. I mean, he's a guy, sure, but those kinda circumstances preclude even sex." Archer closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Didn't want to know that but thanks, Trip, thanks."

"Anytime." Trip sank back into the pillows. His eyes sliding shut with a small sigh.

"You're tired, I better go." Archer said, standing.

"Hey, 'fore you go. Tell Lorian and…" He faltered a moment, his eyes flickering closed. "And Rialta I wanna see them this evening….and T'pol. She alright? Phlox told me but I can't remember."

"T'pol is fine. You saved her life, Trip." Trip nodded and sighed, finally letting his eyes stray shut and falling promptly asleep.

"He is recovering well." Archer turned to see T'pol standing in the middle of sickbay. He hadn't heard her come in. "The last two days he's been cognitive but tires easily. He's getting much stronger." She took a few hesitant steps forward to stand beside Archer. Her face was still and calm, no doubt she had been meditating every chance she could get between repairs but her eyes shimmered with emotion.

"Trip's a fighter." Archer said, almost to himself.

"He saved my life." T'pol said quietly, so soft Archer barely heard her.

"I know." Archer took a step back and it seemed moving out of her sight put him out of her mind as she moved to stand beside Trip's bed. The decision was made right then and there. He'd forget all about what happened to him and T'pol in the null. She and Trip had had one of these bond things before and there had been no adverse affects. Eventually it would fade from his mind. Surely it would. But until then he'd always have a piece of T'pol with him, too bad the rest was for Trip.

Turning away from the two to give them more privacy, Archer left, only to find Rialta leaning in the doorway. Apparently she had managed to shake her Vulcan shadow for once and the two were alone in the long corridor leading to the turbolift. He hadn't anything to say to her so they walked in silence until they reached the turbolift. Before he could reach out for the call button she placed a hand over the controls and looked over at him with something he couldn't quite identify in her eyes.

"So this is it?"

"What are you talking about?" Archer asked, turning to face her with a raised eyebrow that would have done T'pol proud.

"You're just going to give up?" He realised what she was talking about and all of a sudden he found it difficult to meet her eyes. "She doesn't love him. She thinks she does but she doesn't."

"Vulcan's don't…"

"Don't give me that sand rat bullshit!" Rialta snapped, jabbing him in the chest with a finger. "I don't want to hear it. We both know it's a lie!" Archer turned away and a crackling silence descended.

"You said that Trip died saving my life…He saved T'pol's and survived." Archer said suddenly, studying the controls to the elevator her hand no longer blocked. "How long do I live for?" Rialta bit her lip and ran a hand nervously over her swollen stomach.

"I can't tell you…"

"Give me an estimate." The anger in his quiet voice made her flinch even though he had not shouted.

"You live till after the War, I wont tell you how long cause I don't know, it's shortly after the War in my timeline and you're still alive so…you know that is only as long as you don't do something stupid now that you know this." Archer nodded slowly.

"When I asked you about Trip you gave a very vague answer. You said he stayed on a plot of land all the time. Was that plot of land a grave?" Rialta refused to meet his eyes, blinking away tears. Damn hormones. "It was, wasn't it?" She nodded once and refused to meet his eyes. "How long does he have?"

"I can't tell you, you know that." She whispered.

"Please, how long?"

"Until the Andorian comes back from the dead." Rialta bit her lip, turning back to him, her eyes brimming with tears. "That's all I'll say! Don't ask anymore!"

"And if I try to stop it?" Archer asked, still studying her pale face, yellow blotching the cheeks.

"I don't know." She whispered, tears flowing freely down her face. She turned to face him, reaching out a hand to catch his wrist. "John…"

"I love her, I realise that now, but I love him too. He's my best friend, Rialta. I want to give him every chance of happiness in his life…"

"Even if it means your own heart breaking?" Rialta asked quietly, pulling John back around to meet her when he tried to turn away.

"Even if it means my own heart breaking. You know, the Vulcans have a saying I'm rather fond of. It goes, 'The needs of the many…'" Rialta nodded and suddenly pulled him into an awkward hug.

"John, just promise me one thing. Go to a healer and get that bond seen to. I don't think T'pol remembers, to be honest, I didn't think you did either but I'd get it seen to if I were you. I've got to go, I have to return Lorian to his timeline and I have to get back to mine."

"You're not staying together?" Archer asked, Rialta shook her head slowly.

"I'm fond of that Vulcan saying too." She whispered and reached up on her tip toes to kiss his cheek. "Goodbye Captain, I'll see you in three months, one week, four days, eight hours, seventeen minutes and whatever number of seconds." She smiled at him and pressed the button for the lift, ushering him inside when it arrived moments later. The doors slid shut on her smiling face, silvery tears still slipping silently down her cheeks.

"The needs of the many..." She agreed softly, nodding almost to herself and she turned back to sickbay where T'pol sat holding Trip's hand. "But what about the few..."

_**IOIOIO**_

Three months and a bit later…

"_Captain's personal log, stardate 17394.5, the Enterprise has never run so smoothly and even though we're still without our Chief Engineer, I hear he's making a speedy recovery. Since the majority of the crew have spent most of their time on shoreleave, Enterprise has been thrown back into the fray with a deep space exploration mission. The engineers at Alexandria Station warned us to take it easy this time but knowing our luck a red alert is right…"_ Almost as if on cue the Comm. bussed.

"Captain to the bridge, we're picking up a distress signal, Sir." It was Travis' voice over the comm. Hadn't he left T'pol in charge?

"_I must have jinxed it. End log."_ Archer eased Porthos off his lap and jogged the short distance from his cabin to the bridge.

"What is it?"

"We're picking up what appears to be an escape pod, sir, of unknown configuration. It's sending out a distress beacon and we're picking up one life sign, very faint." Hoshi answered, her fingers working over the controls.

"In range?" Archer asked, standing in front of his chair.

"Not quite yet, sir. Another thirty eight seconds." Reed reported which was followed by a thirty seven second silence. "We are in range now Sir, shall I tractor it in?"

"Yes Mister Reed, have Dr. Phlox and a security detail meet me in the cargo bay. Hoshi, got that magic translator of yours?" She smiled up at him and hopped off her chair, falling into step next to Malcolm as he followed Archer in. They kept a professional distance but it was a hell of a lot closer than it was three months ago. A lot of things had changed after Rialta's visit.

"T'pol, you've the bridge."

The ride down to deck 14 was a quiet one and they were met with the detail when the doors opened. They all nodded respectfully to the Captain and Reed, a few smiling at Hoshi. As the bosses girlfriend they had gotten to know her quite well. Loveable Hoshi and strict Malcolm…A lot of things had changed.

The pod itself was egg shaped and about the same height as Malcolm and same width as cook. Archer was able to look down on it.

"Can we open it?" Archer asked, casting a speculative eye over the shiny cobalt exterior. An Engineer who had been on the scene when they arrived nodded and seconds later a hidden panel about the size of Hoshi hissed open, foggy atmosphere rolling out from the dull interior. Malcolm went first, probing the darkness with his phaser.

"Oh my god!" The exclamation itself was enough to set Archer's teeth on edge. Malcolm wasn't the exclaiming type.

"Malcolm?" He asked as the Armoury officer hooked his phaser onto his belt and reached down into the pod. There was a curious keening noise as Malcolm emerged from the smoke, a tiny, wriggling bundle in his arms. Hoshi pushed forward, untangling the squirming mess. A head capped in snow white fuzz shook free and a gurgling giggle sounded in the cargobay, the security officers relaxed as they realised it was child.

"Oh my!" Hoshi breathed, running a finger over the child's forehead. The child clapped its hands happily and giggled, kicking its podgy little legs in delight and cooing. Archer stepped forward and the tiny thing trained its shocking cerulean eyes on him. Three tiny, translucent little horns barely bumped the skin of her forehead and her face was a curious sunshine yellow as she burped and gurgled some more. "Do you think it is…" Hoshi began, cut off when the child reached out and grabbed her finger making a curious bubbly sound. The other hand quested across the red stripe of Malcolm's shoulder and eventually found the pips, tugging off one and thrusting it into its gummy mouth. "No, no! Bad!" Hoshi exclaimed, hurriedly plucking the pip back out and removing the other from Reed's chest before the child's could get it. It screwed up its face and let out a keening wail, its legs and arms like little pistons bashing against Reed.

"Shh, calm down little one." He urged, bouncing her slightly in his arms and rocking her from side to side. "Rialta beag." He whispered.

"What was that Malcolm?"

"It's Rialta, Sir, she told me we'd find her in a pod, this fits everything she said." His blue eyes sparkled with pride as he looked up, the little child still wailing and thumping against him furiously.

"She said she see me in Three months however many weeks, days and seventeen minutes…I didn't know what she meant till now." Archer said, biting his lip. "Malcolm, a Starship is no place for a child. You know that."

"Rialta isn't any child." Malcolm said, cradling the child closer. Hoshi cooed at it, wriggling her finger in front of the wide blue eyes. Instantly the child quietened, entranced by the floating digit.

"True, Malcolm, true." Archer stepped forward and couldn't help but smile as the tiny bundle made mad swipes for Hoshi's finger, drooling and giggling as the finger flew out of reach. A far cry from the Rialta he knew, the Rialta who was with a child of her own. "Still, there is the matter of who'll look after the child."

"I'll do it!" Malcolm and Hoshi intoned almost simultaneously, turning to face each other with almost identical expressions of shock. The doors behind them slid open and Phlox and T'pol strode in.

"T'pol? What are you doing down here, is there something wrong?" Archer asked. T'pol opened her mouth as if to speak then her eyes darted off to one side and her eyebrows shot up. Archer turned to look at what she was looking at but all he saw was the tall, tanned engineer with dark hair that dropped into his eyes and over his ears. He'd need to get that cut soon or he'd have to be reported for breech of uniform. T'pol swallowed, regaining her composure and turning back to Archer.

"I thought you might need my assistance." She said tersely.

"So who's on the bridge?" Archer asked.

"…Travis."

"And?"

"Just Travis." She said, her tone slightly apologetic before she then noticed the bundle in Hoshi's arms. "It is an infant." At the sound of a new voice the child became restless and began to reach up, legs kicking and pistoning. T'pol approached and nearly did a double take when she saw the infant. "Rialta." She breathed and looked to Archer for confirmation. He couldn't help but smile as he nodded.

"Yep," Archer chimed. "Begs godfather."

"God…father?" T'pol asked, narrowing her eyes.

"We'd be honoured to have both you and T'pol as the godparents." Hoshi said, running a finger down the child's podgy arm to quieten it.

"So…you are claiming the child?" T'pol asked, raising an eyebrow.

"I guess so." Hoshi said, smiling up at Malcolm who treated her to one of his rare, charming grins. "After all, who are we to fight fate?" Phlox moved in past them all, his tricorder running over the child.

"She's a little malnourished and has taken a few bruises and scrapes but otherwise appears in perfect health, well…I think. It's hard to tell with new species. Better get her down to sickbay." Phlox' grin was wider than any the humans could manage but it was infectious. Hoshi and Malcolm moved out, tailed by Archer and the security officers who made up the 'honour guard'. The speed at which this would make the rounds of the ship would probably break the record. T'pol hung back, giving a weary look to the engineer.

"I love happy endings, don't you?" He asked with a broad, dazzling white grin.

"Has it been a happy ending? Enterprise was under repair for exactly three months one week and two days!"

"You forgot the hours and minutes but never mind, that always annoyed me anyway." Savock said with a wink.

"Not to mention the fact that Commander Tucker is still under medical care."

"He'll be fine, trust me T'pol. He's got another year or two left in him. I assure you of that." Savock said, solemning slightly. "They remind me of two people I knew once." He said, sadness entering his voice for the first time. "An exiled Romulan named Zakavon and a Betazoid named Ceriaon Brady. Could you imagine an odder pair?"

"Lt. Reed and Ensign Sato?" T'pol asked with a raised eyebrow. Savock looked up and smiled.

"Yes. You know, there aren't many constants in the galaxy, so few in fact that some say there are none…But love is something I have always found. Regardless of the specie or situation. Curious, no?" He turned to T'pol, a satirical twist to his lips. "Even amidst Vulcans. Didn't Surak himself fall in love…haven't you?" T'pol's eyebrows rose and she opened her mouth to say something but it died on her lips. "Good, you're beginning to see now. Denial is the most useless emotion I've ever encountered yet one present, most prominently, in all Vulcans. What a strange irony, don't you think? You know you have emotions but claim to not have them. I tried to purge my emotions once but soon realised what an empty life it would be if I lived the life of a Gol…and what a lie I'd be living. Denying myself the one thing that makes me alive." He smiled, tilting his head to one side. "Go ahead, I know you want to ask."

"Why did you try to purge your emotions?" T'pol asked, hesitant.

"Because I committed the cardinal sin of being a Vulcan…I fell in love and you know what the worst thing was?"

"What?"

"…She loved me just as much, and that's what killed us in the end. Love is a fickle thing, a double edged sword. It can bring you joy that will lift you to the highest places and bring you sorrow that will consume your very soul. My tale is not a happy one, not in the least but I wouldn't change a single page of it." He smiled a small, sad smile and relaxed back against the curved hull of the pod.

"If it brought you such pain then why would you go through that again when you could change it?" Savock shook his head and sighed.

"You know the answer to that question yourself, T'pol. You know the exquisite agony being in love is, but would you change it. Would you ask Soval not to station you here? Would you have left when you were recalled? Life is a fire, sometimes it warms you, comforts you and other times it burns you. But burns heal in time and if you learn nothing else in your entire life from the humans, learn this. Life is not tried, it is merely survived, if your standing outside the fire." Savock extended a hand with a charming smirk. "Play with fire, T'pol but most of all…have fun doing it." He winked at her as she shook his hand. "After you Commander." He said, giving a mocking bow and indicating her to walk ahead. She slipped through the cargo bay doors and turned back to say something but he was gone.

"T'pol, what are you still doing here?" Archer asked, coming to walk beside her as they made for the turbolift.

"Standing outside the fire." She said quietly.

"What was that?"

"Nothing sir. I am curious though as to what is to become of the infant Rialta." Archer grinned over at her and called for the lift.

"Well, Malcolm and Hoshi seem smitten. Seems like we're going to get children on Enterprise or lose two officers."

"Children, as in plural?" T'pol asked, shooting him as incredulous a look as her discipline would allow.

"Well, if Hoshi and Malcolm are allowed have one it'd be unfair to not let anyone else have one. Who knows, Rialta could be the first of a long line of children of Enterprise." Archer smirked, stepping into the lift when it finally arrived, to engineers walking past him. "Don't look so horrified T'pol, you wont be required to change any diapers." He laughed.

"I should hope not!" T'pol said, stepping into the lift.

"Unless of course you have one of your own. Just a suggestion. Time is ticking and the first of Rialta's predictions has come true. Who knows?"

"Rialta never predicted children of Enterprise!" T'pol shot back. Archer smirked as the lift closed and they were sped to the bridge.

_**IOIOIO**_

Fin : )

Hope you enjoyed the ride as much as I have. Don't forget to review, I don't care how long I took posting this. lol


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